Hanging By A Moment
by Preppy in Pink
Summary: “Do you really want me to explain it to you?” She asked him, with a smirk that suggested that she was a little more clued in than she led people to believe. Draco Female Blaise
1. One Day

Me Against the World

Disclaimer: I know that you are going to find this incredibly hard to believe, but Draco Malfoy and posse to do not belong to me. Big shocker, I know.

Author's Note: There are several new characters introduced in this story because the Harry Potter books are Gryffindor-centric and don't tell much of the Slytherin characters that aren't Harry's age. Joel Pritchard, Clarissa Hawthorne, Nora Willows, Madrigal Evans, and Bradin Cabot are not real HP characters. Graham Pritchard is however. (He's sorted in Slytherin in the Goblet of Fire) This story takes place in Draco's sixth year.

This story is also a work in progress, but I will try to post each chapter as soon as possible.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to read this story. Please, please review.

**Chapter One**

**_And they used to say_**

**_That one day you'll forget it_**

**_And you won't hear them_**

**_And they used to say that time_**

**_Goes by but nothing changes_**

**_I won't miss my flight again_**

**_I'm not where I belong_**

**_So give me just one more chance_**

**_And one by one, I'll prove you wrong…_**

**_One by One by Simple Plan_**

"Sixth year is going to be so great." Pansy Parkinson said as she plopped herself down on one of the long wooden benches of the Slytherin table.

Millicent Bulstrode, a pudgy sixth year, nodded in agreement as she herself sat down next to someone that could hardly be called her friend, since all Pansy actually did was insult her. They had the same relationship that Draco felt he and the blockhead brothers had. Not that he was comparing himself to Pansy Parkinson, of all people, mind you.

"Well, look whose back," Pansy snickered. Draco looked up to see who she was referring to. A skinny, pale girl with dark freckles and long dark hair was walking towards them.

"Back? I've never seen her before," Draco said, staring at her. He couldn't remember her at all. Nothing seemed familiar. Not the long dark hair, not the entirely black outfit, not the bright shiny silver locket hanging from her neck. She was new to him.

"Welcome," Pansy said, when the girl was in earshot. "Come, sit, long time no see."

The girl gave a tiny smile, tucked a wandering strand of hair behind her ear, and sat down across from Draco, next to a seventh year Slytherin by the name of Clarissa. Clarissa, a tall girl with shiny blonde hair glanced at the new girl and gave a nod before turning back to her conversation with Joel and Graham Pritchard, seventh and third years respectively.

"So, Zabini, how were the States?" Pansy snickered. Draco felt an unexplained pang of guilt. This girl, although clearly a Slytherin by the patch on her cloak, hardly seemed like the rest of them. It was something in her eyes; her dark green eyes…

"Nice," She said, not providing any more information than this. Draco noticed the corner of Pansy's mouth twitch.

"So, what's your name?" Draco asked her. Zabini, who had been staring at her fingernails, looked up at Draco, her eyes making him feel uneasy.

"Blaise Zabini, I'm the same year as you." She said coldly.

"Oh, sorry, for some reason, I didn't remember you," He said, now unable to remember when a person had made him this uncomfortable.

"I wouldn't have expected you to," She said, returning her gaze to her fingernails.

Dumbledore then stepped up to the head table and began his usual droning speech which was then preceded by the Sorting. Nora Willows, Madrigal Evans, and Bradin Cabot were the only new Slytherins that year, but the number of Hufflepuffs was overwhelming. All three of the first years seemed highly intelligent, which was something Draco could not say about four of his fellow sixth years. The fifth, however, he had a feeling was much different.

"So where did you go to school while you were there?" Millicent asked Blaise, who was silently watching Bradin and Madrigal as the animatedly described the boat ride over.

It took Blaise a second to realize that Millicent was talking to her. "Um, I was home schooled." She answered, quietly, before focusing her gaze on Nora Willows, who was now fighting with Madrigal for Bradin's attention.

"The Ministry allowed that?" Pansy asked, highly suspicious of Blaise.

"My parents were there on business. They had special permission," was all the information she provided, once again infuriating Pansy, who like most other Slytherins, thrived on learning the gossip, secrets, and details of everyone's lives.

"Really?" Pansy inquired, pushing her pumpkin pudding around on her plate until it blended with some ugly green concoction. Disgusted, he slid away from her, probably a little too much because now he was practically sitting in Joel Pritchard's lap. Joel shot him an odd look, before returning to his pile of mashed potatoes and Clarissa.

"Really. Anything else you want to know while you're interrogating me?" She snapped, causing an awkward silence. "Um, I think I am going to unpack," Blaise said suddenly, before jumping to her feet and whisking off towards the door.

Pansy looked at Millicent and nodded. "We should help her. Come on, Crabbe, Goyle." Millicent said, motioning for their boyfriends to follow them. Draco remained seated at the table, although he scooted a little farther from Joel.

"Draco?" Pansy asked in a high shrill voice. Clearly, she was just dating Goyle until she thought Draco would come to his senses about her, which is something he would never do. He'd go to the next Yule Ball with Joel before taking Pansy again.

"I'm still hungry, but you go on up." Draco told her, which was an obvious lie. He hadn't eaten anything in the past ten minutes at least. Neither had Blaise, from the looks of it. She had swirled her food around with her spoon, much like Pansy had, but instead of a gross mess like hers, Blaise's mashed potatoes were in the shape of a heart. He watched her trace it; completely absentmindedly as she talked to Madrigal and Nora. She seemed to find them more interesting than her fellow sixth years.

After Pansy and her entourage went to find the mouse like newcomer, Draco was left sitting with Graham, Joel, Clarissa, and Bradin, the few Slytherins still in the hall. He noticed most of the other students had gone too; the entire Gryffindor table had cleared out as well as the Ravenclaw, and only a lone Hufflepuff who had fallen asleep at dinner, remained at that table.

"How was your holiday, Draco?" Clarissa asked, flipping her hair. Joel let out a sigh, causing Graham to smirk.

"Good," he answered, but he had more important things on his mind, such as Blaise Zabini.

"What do you guys know about Blaise? I swear I've never seen her before."

Joel shook his head. "She left right after that thing with her brother," he said to Clarissa, who nodded in agreement. Bradin, not knowing anything about Blaise and her reappearance, excused himself from the table.

"I don't remember her," Graham said, Draco unsure if Graham was just siding with him or if he honestly didn't remember her.

"You wouldn't, would you? She left after her third year." Clarissa said. "Lost her the same year we lost Oliver Wood. What a bad year."

Joel quickly shot up, "What?"

"Don't get your robes in a knot," Clarissa snapped. "I know he's Gryffindor, but he was still adorable."

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that." Joel replied, looking as if he could find Oliver Wood, he would be a dead man.

"What happened with her brother?" Graham asked his mouth full of a biscuit.

"Gross," Clarissa said, flipping her hair again. "Not really sure, she wouldn't talk about it. Something happened over winter break. He never came back, but she did. Rumors are he got involved with You-Know-Who and died."

Draco was quite stunned about this. Clarissa rarely brought up the topic of Voldemort, she was utterly terrified of him. This trio, they had become his friends over the past year or so, much more so than Parkinson, Goyle, and the others had ever been, and he knew that Clarissa, Joel, and Graham were never on the Dark Lord's side. Perhaps that was why he hung out with them. He originally thought it was because they had six hundred times more brain cells than his fellow sixth years combined, but he now thought it was their similar thoughts. None of them wanted to become Death Eaters like their parents. Not one of them. Of course this topic was never discussed outside of their little four some. What if someone found out that four Slytherins had full intentions of turning their backs on the Dark Lord? Draco knew that would be killed on the spot; no one turned against the Dark Lord.

"So, do you think that was what Blaise was doing in America?" Graham asked, his mouth now biscuit free.

"I don't know. I've never really talked to her. I don't think anyone really has. She took a couple classes with us, she was smart, taking advanced classes," Joel said. "I talked to her brother a couple of times, Blaine or Blair or something really close to her name. He seemed like an okay guy. Never gave off the air that he was doing dirty work for the Dark Lord but I guess you can never trust anyone."

Clarissa nodded in agreement. The sleeping Hufflepuff gave a loud snore.

"So…" Joel said, trying to ignore the uncomfortable silence that ensued for a few seconds. "Draco, I was thinking, we need to change the quidditch line up this year. We cannot afford to have those two blockheads are beaters again this year."

"What were you thinking then?" Draco asked, honestly quite relieved that Joel was getting rid of them. The less time he spent with them, the better.

"Well, I'll still be chaser, as will Clarissa and Graham, and you'll be seeker of course." Joel said, the three others nodding in agreement. "I've heard some pretty good things about Kate Judd, for keeper. And I think we'll move Jesse from keeper to beater, because let's face it, he sucked at blocking the goal. And we'll still need one more beater, but I'm sure someone will turn up if we hold a tryout."

It was nearly an hour later that Draco wandered up to the Slytherin common room, with Graham in tow. Joel and Clarissa went to wake up the sleeping Hufflepuff, and then disappeared. Graham, who was so sleepy, he had almost pulled a Hufflepuff, and fell asleep while Joel was discussing some new quidditch move that the German seeker had pulled off at one of the summer games. Clarissa, seemed to be drifting off too, but she did a better job of staying awake than Graham.

When they reached the common room, the fire was barely alive, with only one person in front of it; Blaise. She was curled up under a dark green blanket, reading something that captivated her attention; she didn't notice Graham nor Draco until a half asleep Graham muttered, "Good night Draco, nice to meet you Blaise," as he stumbled up the stairs.

Blaise looked up from her book, obviously shocked that a boy she had never seen knew her name. Draco didn't understand way though, she honestly could not have believed that people weren't talking about her return.

"Hello," Blaise said icily, as Draco sat in the arm chair adjacent to the sofa that Blaise was on.

"Listen," Draco said, right as Blaise returned to her novel. She put the book down again, but looked perturbed. "I'm sorry about earlier. I just don't have a very good memory."

"Well, it's not like you took the time to get to know me then," she replied.

Draco studied her for a minute. Why hadn't he gotten to know her then? Why did he hang out with the others instead of her? She was far prettier, she even rivaled that of Clarissa in a completely opposite way. Clarissa was blonde with loose curls that fell to her shoulders; Blaise's dark brown hair was longer and dead straight. Clarissa's skin was rosy and flawless; Blaise's was pale like his, but with a sprinkle of dark freckles across her nose and cheeks. The eyes were the most different though, Clarissa's bright blue eyes held warmth and happiness; Blaise's brilliant green eyes held sadness and secrets. Draco could always sense secrets. It was in the eyes. And from the looks of it, Blaise had quite a few.

"What?" Blaise asked, snapping Draco out of his trance, causing him to realize that he had been staring at her.

He could feel his cheeks flush. What was this? He never was embarrassed. Especially not around girls. They all seemed to worship him. But not her. "You're really pretty." He said, instantly regretting the words when he heard them come out of his mouth. He waited for her reaction.

Blaise just stared back at him for what seemed like the longest seconds ever. She gave him a tiny smile and a look that suggested to Draco she had never heard those words directed at her before. "Thanks," she whispered, as if she said it any louder, it would make his compliment untrue.

"What are you reading?" He asked, trying to glance at the cover of her book. It was blank.

This time it was Blaise who looked flushed. "It's nothing," she said, tucking the book into a pocket of her cloak. "Wow, it seems late. What time is it?"

"A little past midnight, I think," Draco replied.

"I didn't realize that I had been down here so long. I was trying to avoid those two trolls." She admitted.

"Crabbe and Goyle?" Draco asked, unable to see why she was bothering to hide from them. They were so stupid they probably hadn't even noticed she arrived.

"No, Pansy and Millicent. Merlin, I hated them then, and I hate them even more now. I don't see how you put up with them." Blaise said, not caring that Draco knew her true feelings towards the people she thought were his friends.

"Simple, I don't." Draco said, and Blaise's mouth twitched, almost like she wanted to smile. "I hate them. They just sort of hang around. Joel, Clarissa, and Graham are more my friends."

"Joel and Clarissa?" Blaise said. "I remember them. I didn't see Joel though."

"He was sitting next to me at dinner."

"Wow, he got a lot taller since I last saw him and he finally cut his hair. I didn't know his eyes were brown," Blaise reminisced.

"Yeah, Graham's his little brother."

"Ah, the sleepy kid. That explains why he knew my name. I didn't think I'd seen him before."

"He came during our fourth year. After you left." Draco said.

"Oh," she said, her tiny smile slowly disappearing. She stood up and folded the blanket she had been wrapped up in. "I think I'm going to go to bed, but it was nice meeting you, Draco Malfoy," she said, before heading up the staircase.

He couldn't be sure, but out of the corner of his eye, he thought her saw Blaise hug the untitled book to her chest and smile to herself.

He wandered up to the boy's staircase, to the seventh year dorms. There were only two seventh year Slytherins; Clarissa and Joel. There always seemed to be a much smaller number of Slytherins than any other house. It could be lonely, but Draco kind of preferred it this way. Less people to annoy him. Since Joel was the only seventh year boy, there were extra beds in his dorm. Draco crashed on the bed next to the sleeping Joel, glad he did not have to share a dorm with the snoring Crabbe and Goyle, and drifted off to sleep, quite happy with the way this year was turning out.

I know this was kind of a slow chapter and rather short too, but I was really eager to post; but don't worry the next chapter will be much more witty and longer. Also, after reading this, my friend suggested I add a disclaimer. In this story, Draco is not being a soft goody-goody and is not on the same side as Harry Potter. He still hates Gryffindors very much, it's just that he does not like the idea that when he grows up he will have to live to serve the Dark Lord. As we all know, Draco does not take kindly to orders, and does not want to be a servant to someone else when he could very much be living his own life. Freedom is his real motivation for being against the Dark Lord, not good versus evil like Potter.

Thanks again and please, please, please review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	2. She's A Rebel

Hanging By A Moment

Disclaimer: Yes, since the last chapter, I have indeed become the owner of all things Harry Potter. Yeah, right.

Author's Note: Thanks so much for the lovely reviews! I really appreciate them! Also, here's the age list that someone asked for (note, the only characters listed are the ones that have an actual part (even if minor) in the story so far or soon to come)

1st Years: Nora Willows, Bradin Cabot, Madrigal Evans

2nd Years: None

3rd Years: Graham Pritchard

4th Years: Christina Woodberry, Kate Judd

5th Years: Jesse Green

6th Years: Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson, Millicent Bulstrode, Blaise Zabini, Crabbe, Goyle

7th Years: Joel Pritchard, Clarissa Hawthorne

**Chapter Two:**

_**She's a rebel, she's a saint**_

_**She's the salt of the earth**_

_**And she's dangerous,**_

**_She's a rebel vigilante,_**

**_Missing link on the brink_**

_**Of destruction**_

**_From Chicago to Toronto_**

**_She's the one that they call 'oh whats her name'_**

_**She's the symbol of resistance and**_

_**She's holding my heart like a hand grenade**_

_**She's A Rebel by Green Day**_

He had finished getting ready and headed down to breakfast, Blaise was no where to be seen. When entered the Great Hall, he noticed Millicent and company discussing something, the trio of first years sitting together towards the middle of the table, and Graham sitting by himself at the end opposite from the aforementioned pain in the butts.

"Morning," Graham said, not nearly as tired as the previous night, "Where's Joel?"

"He wouldn't get up. I tried to wake him but then he charmed his pillow to hit me, so I left."

"Where's Blaise?" Draco asked, rather hushed. He had a feeling that Pansy and them were already talking about him; he wasn't sitting with them.

"Over there," Graham said, motioning towards the Gryffindor table with his piece of toast.

Blaise was standing at the end of a table talking to that girl, whose name he couldn't remember. She was the only remaining member of the three girls that had been chasers for so long. "Katie Bell!" he said, suddenly remembering. Pansy, hearing him say another girl's name, snapped up and glared at the Gryffindor chaser.

Blaise and Katie hugged for a second, talking non-stop to each other. This ability of girls always amazed Draco. How could they talk and understand the other person that was talking at the same time? He had enough trouble understanding girls when it was just them talking let alone if he was talking at the same time.

"Can you believe the nerve of him?" Clarissa snapped as she sat down next to Draco. "He had the nerve to charm his pillow to hit me when I tried to wake him up!" She complained, Draco assumed about Joel.

"Toast?" Graham offered, his mouth full of the aforementioned breakfast food.

"Dude, you have got to learn to talk with your mouth empty," Clarissa hissed.

"What?" Graham said, toast still in jaws.

"Gross!" She yelled, pushing his lower jaw up to meet his face, nearly causing him to choke.

Draco continued watching the Katie Bell – Blaise Zabini non-stop talking fest. Whatever Katie was saying, now involved the use of her hands, and Blaise was smiling at whatever she said. Draco's eyes stayed on her smile. It was pretty and didn't seem to belong to the girl that wandered into the Great Hall by herself yesterday. She was an entirely different person with a smile on her face.

"Draco, come sit here," Pansy said, waving him over. He motioned that he was sitting with Graham and Clarissa. Clarissa waved, causing Pansy and Millicent to snarl.

"Well, that ought to take care of her for a good three or four minutes," Clarissa said, pleased with herself. "Oh, Blaise, come sit with us!"

Distracted by the pug-faced girl, Draco had missed Blaise wandering back to the Slytherin side of the Great Hall. A little startled, but she sat next to Graham anyway.

"How's it going?" Clarissa asked with a smile. "Missed you."

"I missed you too," Blaise said, clearly happy that somebody seemed to have noticed she left.

"Toast? See I said it without my mouth full," Clarissa said, offering the toast to Blaise, but commenting to Graham, meanwhile confusing all three of them.

"Um, sure?" Blaise said, taking a piece from the plate Clarissa held.

"Did you sleep well?" Clarissa asked.

"Pansy interrogated me for the entire night. Where did you stay in America? Why were your parents there? Why didn't you just stay enrolled at Hogwarts? What happened to Blake?" There Blaise shut up, as if she had said too much. They sat in awkward silence until…

"Why didn't anybody wake me up? I would have missed breakfast!" Joel grumbled, his hair still ruffled from sleeping.

"Wait one minute!" Clarissa and Draco said in unison.

"I tried to wake you up-"

"-but you charmed your pillow-"

"-to hit me-"

"-and me-"

"-so I hit you with it -"

"-and left you to sleep-"

"- then you have the nerve-"

"- to yell at us about letting -"

"- you oversleep - "

" - we ought to be yelling at you -"

" - for hitting us with a pillow!"

"All right, sheesh, I'm sorry," Joel muttered. "Is there any toast left?"

"Toast!" Graham, mouth once again full, said, instantly regretting it.

"Dammit, Graham!" Clarissa yelled, slamming her glass of orange juice down, juice splattering everywhere.

"Glad to be back," Blaise replied, rolling her eyes.

The trios of first years disappeared shortly after breakfast, they appeared to Draco as if they would be as inseparable as the Gryffindor Dream Team. He just hoped they weren't as annoying. Fat chance, they were Slytherins after all.

Clarissa excused herself to gossip with a fourth year Slytherin, Christina Woodberry, who had apparently heard something about Ravenclaw Mandy Brocklehurst that 'simply couldn't wait' as Christina had put it.

"Quidditch Try-outs, three days, be there," Joel said.

"Sure," Graham replied.

Joel rolled his eyes. "I was talking to Draco, but whatever you can come too."

"Shut up," Graham hissed, flinging a piece of scrambled egg at Joel.

Joel lunged over the table to wrestle him. "Is that any way to treat your cool older brother?" he teased.

"I don't know. If I ever find a cool older brother I'll let you know," Graham said, still in headlock with Joel.

"Oh now, you're a funny guy, are you?" he teased right back.

Draco heard Blaise sniffle. He looked at her and she quickly stood up and hurried out of the dining room. Concerned, Draco left Graham in his headlock and rushed after her.

"Hey, are you okay?" He asked, placing his hand on her shoulder.

One second he's trying to comfort her, the next he's flat on his back, Blaise's wand pointed right at his chest. It took her a second to realize who he was and when she did, she tucked her wand away and quickly helped him to his feet.

"What in Merlin's name was that for?" Draco asked, brushing the wrinkles out of his robes.

Blaise blushed. "I'm so sorry, Draco, I just got paranoid when I felt someone touch my shoulder. I didn't realize it was you."

Draco groaned that it was alright but deep down wondered what on earth had happened to Blaise that made her that paranoid. Sure, people have snuck up on and scared the daylights out of him, but he never brought them to the ground.

"Were you alright in there?" He asked again, this time hoping the response wasn't him hitting the floor.

"Yeah, I just guessed it got to me. I miss my brother." She said, and again for the second time that morning, she seemed to have regretted mentioning him.

Blaise folded her arms over her chest and started walking out to the castle grounds. Draco quickly followed suit after turning around, nearly walking into a Hufflepuff.

"So, um maybe do you want me to give you a tour of the grounds today? Since its Sunday you know, and we don't have class yet." Draco asked her.

Blaise kept walking but looked at him. "Draco I went to Chicago and Toronto for a little while too, not to memory erasing camp. I went here for three years, I think I know my way around," She commented, but after perhaps noticing the look on Draco's face, she added "but I probably don't remember everything, so why not?'

Draco straightened up, making himself half an inch taller, as if he was someone important. "Well, as you can see this is the outside, and this here is the bridge connecting to that hill over the – what do you think you are doing?" He interrupted himself.

Blaise had climbed up on the ledge of the bridge, and was walking the edge like a balance beam. She waved her arms in the air like she was losing her balance, but she had a smile on her face at the same time.

"Am I making you nervous?" She teased, the sadness from talk of her brother disappearing as fast as it came. Blaise's actions certainly boggled Draco's mind, but he felt oddly connected with her.

"Yes." Draco admitted, extending his arms to catch her. Blaise wiggled even more, delighting in the fact that Draco actually seemed nervous.

"Come on," he said and he made an attempt for her hand, which nearly caused him to fall over.

Blaise looked down at him and smirked, "I don't think I'm the one you should be worrying about."

"Oh yeah, you will be singing a different tune when you fall off that bridge," Draco snapped, pulling himself back up.

"Tune?" Blaise laughed "Who says tune? That's like an old person saying."

"Shut up!" Draco yelled at her, but in a friendly way.

"Draco, I'm falling," she laughed, her arms flailing.

For those few brief minutes, the world around them suspended. Their problems were forgotten; Blaise's mysterious life was left unnoticed, her apparent heartbreak overlooked; Draco's family problems dissolved, his planned out future disappeared. What was left was two sixteen year olds acting like, well, sixteen year olds. And whether or not they noticed it, that was the moment their lives changed forever. They were intertwined, whether they liked it or not. But their peaceful moment was soon interrupted by a high pitch shrill voice shouting –

"DRACO!" Pansy screamed to get his attention, so loud, that both Draco and Blaise were startled. As if in slow motion, Draco watched Blaise's saddle shoe miss the edge of the bridge and she fell off the edge. He grabbed her wrists as she fell, catching her at eye level, revealing the fear in her eyes that only seconds earlier had been happiness.

"You moron!" Draco yelled at Pansy, but when she saw Blaise fall, the pug faced witch vanished.

"Draco," Blaise cried, her wrists aching. "Don't let go," she whispered.

"Never." He replied, although entirely unsure of how he was going to pull her up. Blaise was skinny and he was fit, but not strong. Seekers were supposed to be light and slender, not muscular. And pulling a teenage girl up and over the edge of a bridge, definitely required muscle.

"Draco," she said, quieter than before.

"I'm trying," he said, pushing his foot against the bridge wall. Suddenly he felt himself falling backwards his hands still attached to her wrists. For the second time that day, he landed on his back, but now he had a companion, lying half on top of him, half next to him.

"Ouch." Blaise said after a second of silence. "Ouch."

"Funny, I have that exact same thought." He said causing Blaise to giggle. He liked her giggle and something inside he wanted her to do it again.

Blaise sat up slowly, relieving Draco of the weight on his stomach. He sat and looked around, there were no visible injuries on him. The same could not be said for Blaise, however.

"I think I'm bleeding," she said, and Draco quickly saw that her knee high socks were ripped where her knees skidded against the wall of the bridge as she fell. Her wrists were also slightly purple from where he had held her up.

"Can you walk?" he asked, pretty sure that she couldn't. Her legs were messed up.

"Yes," Blaise replied stubbornly, "No." she said, a split second later once she tried to stand up.

"Here, let me help you," Draco said, helping Blaise to her feet. It quickly became evident that she couldn't put weight on either leg yet. "I'll carry you back to the common room."

"You'll carry me?" Blaise said, one eyebrow raised in a truly Slytherin manner.

"Well, I could just leave you here bleeding to death and all." He told her, knowing very well that her wounds were not fatal.

"Well, if this is my only option…" she said, slowly climbing onto Draco's back.

"Oof!" He said, grumbling under her weight.

He couldn't see her but was pretty sure she was glaring at him. "Shut up, this was your idea," she told him, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"And whose idea was it to stand on the edge of a bridge?" He reminded her.

"Point taken." She muttered, hugging him tighter.

"I think that that was the longest possible route back to the Slytherin tower." Draco said, dumping Blaise onto the Slytherin couch.

"Hey, you were leading the way," Blaise told him, gently touching her knee.

"I know, smarty pants." He muttered, examining her knee. "It looks bad."

"Why thank you, Healer, I would have never come to that conclusion myself." She said, pulling out her wand and summoning some sort of liquid from the girls dormitory.

She poured some on her knees and most of the wound closed up. A small scar on her left knee remained, but that was the only evidence that she had ever been hurt. He wanted to ask her what kind of potion that was but the way she was avoiding his eyes told him that she did not want him to ask. And for once, Draco ignored his urge to be pushy and nosy, and just let her walk up the stairs, with a small limp, and put it away.

"Are we going to continue this tour?" Blaise asked, suddenly reappearing from her room.

"You mean you didn't see enough when I carried you piggyback throughout half the school?" Draco replied.

Blaise rolled her eyes. " I want to see the quidditch pitch."

* * *

Thanks for reading!

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Please, please, please review! The more reviews, the more motivated I am to sit down and write the chapter!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	3. What Makes You Different

Hanging By A Moment

Disclaimer: The characters of Joel Pritchard, Clarissa Hawthorne, Blake Zabini, and Corrine Colt are mine. The rest, well, they belong to someone else. Not me, unfortunately.

_You don't run with the crowd, you go your own way_

_You don't play after dark, you light up my day_

_You got your own kind of style that sets you apart_

_Baby, that's why you captured my heart_

_I know sometimes you feel like you don't fit in_

_But this world doesn't know what you have within_

_When I look at you, I see something rare_

_A rose that can grow anywhere_

_And there's no one I know that can compare_

_What makes you different makes you beautiful_

_What there inside you shines through to me_

_In your eyes I see all the love I'll ever need_

_What makes you different makes you beautiful to me_

_You got something so real, you touch me so deep_

_Material things don't matter to me_

_So come as you are, you've got nothing to prove_

_You've won me with all that you do_

_And I want to take this chance to say to you_

_What makes you different makes you beautiful_

_What there inside you shines through to me_

_You don't know how you touched my life_

_In so many ways, I can't describe_

_What makes you different makes you beautiful_

_What's there inside you shines through to me_

_What Makes You Different by Backstreet Boys_

"So, I'm thinking we start with a couple of speed laps around the pitch, you know, just to weed out those who aren't able to stay in the air for long periods of time." Joel told Draco, staring at his clipboard as if it was the solution to ending the war between wizarding kind.

"That makes sense." Draco replied, trying to stifle a yawn. It was early Saturday morning; besides them, only an extremely eager second year was in the quidditch pitch.

"We could release some bludgers, just you know, to make them fly faster." Joel suggested, seriously contemplating it. "I bet we could spell them to make them fly faster."

"Are you testing their speed or trying to kill them?" Draco asked, half joking. A dead serious, quidditch-fanatic of a captain stared back at him, clearly not appreciating Draco's relaxed stance on what he considered the most important choices he would make his seventh year.

"Bludgers?" A voice behind them said. "Do you want them to call you Captain Blood?"

Draco's heart skipped a beat. She always stayed up so late, how on earth was she already up and about?

"Blaise, you're up early." Draco replied, instantly regretting it once he said it. Couldn't he have at least said good morning first? Why did Blaise make him babble like Crabbe? It was unnerving.

"What can I say? I'm a morning person," she shrugged, before sipping whatever was in her cup. "You however, my friend, are not."

"Tell me something I don't know." Draco muttered, glaring at the cause of his early rise.

"May I suggest caffeine?" She offered him her cup.

"Coffee! You are a goddess!" He declared, happily accepting the cup from her. She smiled, but eyed him as he drank half the cup in single swallow.

"You can't have that!" Joel cried out, snatching Draco's temporary happiness right out of his hand.

"HEY!" Draco's sleepiness snapped. He couldn't remember when he had been this pissed off at Joel.

"You are going to have twenty minute caffeine high and then be more tired than you are now!" Joel told him, handing the coffee back to Blaise, who, to Draco's dismay, was snickering.

"You knew he'd do that, didn't you?" He asked her, not looking at her, but watching Joel stomp over to where the second year was standing nervously.

"No, but it was a pleasant surprise," Blaise admitted with a giggle she failed to suppress.

"Thank you for that lovely moment of humility."

"Anytime." She replied, moving closer so that she was now standing next to him. "Where's the rest of your team?"

"I have no idea," Draco said, only now realizing that Clarissa, Graham, and Jesse were absent from this early morning team meeting. This note didn't really help his growing animosity towards Joel.

"Hey Joel, where are the others?" Draco asked accusingly. If he had to be up at six a.m., he was going to wake up everyone else with him.

"Graham and Jesse are in the team room, trimming the school brooms for those trying out that don't have one yet." Joel told him, while pointing the second year in the direction of the benches where he could wait for the try-outs to begin; Joel clearly thought he was underfoot.

"And Clarissa?" He repeated, his eyes darting between the trying-to-be-nonchalant Joel and the trying-not-to-laugh Blaise.

"Um….well…..she's around somewhere." He said, turning his back on Draco. "Would you please just sit there and when it's your turn, I will call your name." The second year muttered something. "Yes, I can pronounce it!" a frustrated Joel snapped.

"I bet he didn't wake her up!" Draco hissed to no one in particular.

"Your annoyingness is not helping your chances of getting on this team!" Joel shouted.

"I think it's safe to bet he's not on the team." Blaise commented.

"Good." Draco replied. "I hate morning people."

One of Blaise's eyebrows rose higher than the other. Draco missed the sign that his comment hit a nerve with her and just continued on his way to the team room, Blaise in tow.

"Top of the morning to you!' Jesse called out when Draco entered the team room, unaware that Blaise had followed him in.

"Ah, another morning person," Blaise smiled at Draco.

"What are you doing in here?" Draco spun around and asked her.

"Yeah, this is the boys' part of the team room." Graham told her.

"How come girls can go on the boys' side of the room and boys can't go on the girls' side? I must have tried like forty times and can't get through but she just saunters in, no force field…." Jesse trailed off upon the realization that all three of his fellow Slytherins were staring at him. "Um…please, don't tell your brother about what I just said." He pleaded with Graham.

"Speaking of Clarissa, where the hell is she?" Draco asked a scarlet-faced Jesse and a nearly crying with laughter Graham where their fellow, and only female, teammate was.

"Probably still asleep." Graham said, regaining his composure and returning to clipping the split ends off of the Cleansweep 715 he was holding.

"What?" Draco cried out. He was pissed off. He needed sleep just as much as Clarissa.

"You know, it's one of those benefits to snogging the team captain," Jesse said, looking at Blaise.

"Clarissa is snogging Joel?" Draco asked, still in shock. This was too much information to process this early in the morning.

"You didn't know?" Blaise, Jesse, and Graham asked in unison.

"Come on, I've only known them recently for like a week and I knew that they were together," Blaise told him. "You are oblivious to everything."

"I am not." Draco replied, indignantly, folding his arms over his chest. "I knew that they sort of had this thing, like they liked each other but I didn't realize they were actually, you know, together."

"Draco, they are with each other non-stop. They eat meals together, they leave meals together, they study together, and they spend every minute together." Blaise pointed out.

"I thought that was because they were the only seventh years. They had to be close."

"Why would you believe that? You and I aren't close to our fellow sixth years." Blaise pointed out. Draco was beginning to hate how she always seemed to be right.

"Point taken," he admitted defeat unwillingly. "But it's still not fair that he lets her sleep in when the rest of us are out here at the break of dawn."

"Hey, Draco, Joel's a pretty fair person. You can probably just talk to him about it and he'll let you sleep in." Jesse suggested suspiciously, now finally back to trimming the Comet Seven Eighty-Six in his own hands.

"I think he's right," Blaise agreed with Jesse, nodding her head with an equally suspicious smile upon her face.

"And if I'm not," Jesse smirked, "You can always try snogging him and see how that works." He and Blaise burst into a fit of giggles as if they thought Draco should have seen this coming.

"Shut up!" Draco told them, folding his arms across his chest and stomping out of the team room. Not gone for a second, he had returned and latched his hand around the wrist he had held for dear life only days earlier. "This is the team room, out now!" He told Blaise, dragging her out with him, his pale skin the color of the Dream Team's robes as his own fellow Slytherins laughed at his expense.

"Oh that was real mature in there," He told her as the two headed back over to where they had left Joel.

"And your non-stop complaining about Clarissa sleeping in was?" She retorted. Draco growled, knowing very well that once again, Blaise Zabini was right.

"You know, you can let go now, right?" Blaise pointed out after a few seconds.

Draco looked down and only then did he become aware that his hand was still around her tiny wrist. He let go, revealing the slightly purple marks from those unforgettable, unable to breathe moments when her life depended solely on the strength of his.

"Um, yeah, sorry." He apologized, something he had never sincerely done before. Blaise looked at him like she wanted to say something, but just turned away.

"Where did you go?" Joel demanded to know, when Draco had returned in his sight. "I need you to help organize this thing."

"Joel, there are all of two people here." Draco pointed out.

"You don't think I know that? That blasted second year's friend showed up too. I will let a Ravenclaw play for us before I let those two annoying blockheads play."

"You're not desperate at all, now are you?" Blaise commented as she watched the second years, whom, to both her and Draco didn't seem to be a problem. The one holding a broom was a little fidgety, but as were all people waiting for their chance to prove themselves for the quidditch team.

"You know what? I have no patience, and I know it. So just deal." Joel said, a little harsher than he probably meant to.

The pace of the morning immediately picked up speed and within a mere half an hour, Clarissa had risen and come to the pitch, slightly confused by Graham and Jesse making kissing sounds while looking at Draco, and the number of the Slytherins trying out had increased dramatically, nearly causing Joel to lose his mind.

"Some sort of order, please!" he pleaded, waving his clipboard around.

The crowd of people ignored him and continued wondering around and loudly gossiping with one another.

"LISTEN UP!" Blaise shouted, startling Draco. She was so small and fragile looking; he would have never matched up that decibel of shout with her.

A crowd full of people stopped in the middle of what they were doing and looked at her. Clarissa stopped mid-sentence in her conversation with Christina Woodbury and Kate Judd. A couple of third years stopped tossing their brooms in the air as if this was baton practice; unfortunately for the tallest of this quartet, his broom was in mid-air at the time of the unexpected shout, the shout that distracted him from his broom until it came crashing down on his shoulder. Jesse and Graham stopped circling Draco, both were still annoying him with the unrealistic sounding kissing noises. Joel just looked stunned that the crowd had shut up for the small hardly known sixth year and not for the six foot tall, known to be impatient seventh year

"Um, thanks," Joel said to her, a little out of it. She nodded as if she knew that she was a better leader than him.

"Okay! I need those trying out to be a beater over by the stands, those trying out for keeper by the rings! Clarissa! Graham! You monitor those trying out for keeper, Draco and Jesse will have the rest!"

A good ten or twelve Slytherins scurried over to the stands, a few more scampered towards the goals. Draco thought surely with that many trying out, they were bound to find an awesome team. Sadly, he was wrong.

"NEXT!" Draco moaned as the current candidate whacked his partner in the head with a bat.

"I'm just having a bad day," the first year whined as he stomped off the field.

"These people are about as good as my cousin Katrina." Jesse commented. Blaise, who had stuck around the try-outs claiming she had nothing better to do, and Draco simply stared back at him until Jesse realized that neither Blaise nor Draco knew a thing about Katrina's quidditch beating abilities. "She's three and can barely sit on a broom." He elaborated, stuffing a licorice twist in his mouth.

"Okay, who's next?" Draco asked. Jesse, who was holding the parchment, motioned to the mouthful of licorice whips, indicating that he couldn't answer. Draco didn't understand his hand gestures, but the girl that he felt mysteriously attracted to did.

"Let's see." Blaise muttered, running her clear fingernail polished finger down the parchment. "Corrine Colt is next."

Corrine, a tall strawberry blonde fifth year stood up from her seat on the stands and smiled as she walked forward, her smile especially aimed at Jesse. He smiled and raised an eyebrow, signaling to Draco that he had already decided; Jesse was giving her a perfect ten.

"Somebody's not being objective…" Blaise whispered in a singsong voice that seemed to hint at Draco that Corrine wasn't someone Blaise felt was deserving of Jesse. He felt the sudden urge to hit Jesse and yet didn't know why.

"Huh? What? You don't know what you're talking about." Jesse answered, clearly flushed, now preoccupied with the thought that Corrine knew of his brand spanking new crush.

The smile disappeared off of Blaise's face and she reached into the quidditch trunk for a bludger and beater bat for Corrine.

Corrine didn't take the bat and bludgers but smiled and then glanced over Jesse's shoulder, something in the near distance catching her warm chocolate color eyes. "You know," she said, now looking back at Blaise and Draco, "you have company."

Blaise and Draco whipped around to find a group of people that certainly weren't invited. Four boys and five girls all clad in burgundy and gold ties and crests, the two normal clothing items that separated the houses' uniforms, standing at the edge of the quidditch pitch. The smallest boy, realizing they were spotted let out a squeak that alerted the eight others that four Slytherins were marching towards them; two armed with brooms, one with a bludger and a bat, and the other with a piece of parchment and a licorice twist.

"I don't remember seeing your names on the try-out list." Draco hissed, but only the smallest boy, the name Colin Creevey coming to mind, was scared.

"Funny." The male red-haired member of the Dream Team snarled. Ron Weasley, the name itself brought anger to Draco's mind, was accompanied by his heroic best friend, Harry Potter, his obvious know-it-all crush, Hermione Granger, his pretty, fiery younger sister, Ginny, the photo-loving pipsqueak, Colin Creevey, a giggly girl named Parvati Patil, the hot-headed boyfriend of Parvati's friend, Seamus Finnegan, Seamus's girlfriend, Lavender Brown, and the quidditch captain herself, Katie Bell.

"You of all people should know that quidditch try-outs are private." Blaise told Katie, whom Draco thought was her friend. It pleased him that loyalty to her house seemed to override her apparently not so good friendship with Katie.

"Technically they are not. Practices are private." Katie said rather coldly, holding out a piece of parchment for Draco to read.

He read it with Corrine reading over his left shoulder and Jesse reading over his right. "So, what you're saying is that because not everyone on this field is technically a quidditch member, it means that this time slot is public? That's a load of dragon dung and you know it. Who made this? One of your stupid brothers?" he asked the red-haired siblings.

"Go ahead, make accusations. That's a copy right from the pages of the Hogwarts Rule Book." Hermione declared, quite proud of herself, motioning to the book in her hand. It appeared to be quite heavy, making Draco think the only possible reason for her carrying it around would be to let people think she had read the whole thing.

"Oh, shut up," Corrine snapped, eager to join in the verbal fight.

"Oh, I'm scared." Ginny teased, but Colin didn't seem to feel quite as secure as her.

"Isn't nice how you didn't bring this up until after your try-outs? That's quite convenient, now isn't it?" Blaise pointed out. Katie paled a bit, as if this infraction in the rules could suddenly rule unfavorably on her.

"We, uh, didn't find this out until, um, after our try-outs." Parvati clearly lied.

"So, sometime between eight thirty or so last night when your try-outs ended and seven a.m. when our try-outs began, you found this information?" Blaise asked, skeptical. "Let's see, what about that story makes me not believe you? Oh, I know, the fact that it's all lies."

"Shut up," Lavender hissed, much in the same way Corrine did.

"I think it's time for you all to leave." Jesse said, uncharacteristically cool and collected, with what Draco could only assume what was an attempt to show off to Corrine.

"We can stay all day if we want." Hermione replied proudly. "The rules say so."

"We didn't come to your try-outs, now give us the same respect and leave ours." Jesse repeated his basic message.

"If you didn't come then how come Blaise knew what time our practice ended?" Katie snapped happily, as if she had finally cornered them.

Before her fellow Slytherins could even turn to look at her, she snapped "Because that's when you came stomping in the Great Hall all muddy, only to accuse me of being responsible for my brother's death!" Blaise shouted, tears brimming at her green, suddenly very emotional, eyes.

So, that was why Katie and Blaise were not talking. He almost didn't dare to think it, but who telling the truth when it came to Blake's death? He couldn't imagine Blaise having anything to do with the brother, she so desperately missed's death.

"Leave," Draco said sternly, suddenly only really wanting Katie gone, the others could stick around for all he cared.

"Well, you never did answer my question Blaise, you did have something to do with Blake's death, didn't you?" Katie asked.

The tears were about to fall. One more comment, and Draco knew that the Gryffindors would have what they wanted, a broken hearted Slytherin. Little did they know, there were several already, Blaise included.

"But Voldemort was still a factor in it, wasn't he?" Hermione suggested, hugging the rule book to her chest. "Blake was a Death Eater, wasn't he?"

"Shut up! Get out of here!" Blaise screamed, pointing with the beater bat to the pitch exit. She was stronger than Draco gave her credit for. The tears hadn't fallen with that comment, but they were still certainly on the horizon.

"We can stay here if we want!" Hermione said smugly. Draco's rival and her platonic friend glanced at her as if it was occurring to him that maybe the Gryffindors were going a little too far. For once, Draco agreed with the boy he secretly wished had killed the Dark Lord when he was an infant.

The tears continued to well up. Blaise fought to push them back, not very successful. A single tear slipped down her cheek just as a single corner of Hermione's mouth turned up in a smirk. "That's what I thought." She replied, turning around to walk away, increasing the ten meters or so already between the houses.

Blaise stormed off towards her, Draco assumed to prevent Hermione from having the last word. Hermione was a fast walker however and Blaise was concentrating on preventing the rest of the tears from falling, so the distance increased even more before Hermione turned around and shouted "Go back to your Death Eater- Voldemort-worshiping friends and leave us alone!"

Draco felt as if the whole quidditch pitch had suddenly gone in super slow motion. Joel and Clarissa heard Hermione and finally realized they had company in the pitch. Katie had gasped at Hermione's words, clearly knowing that Hermione had crossed the line. Corrine looked rather unfazed; but Draco was pretty sure that her aunt and older sister were Death Eaters. Jesse looked shocked as if he didn't know how to respond. Harry and Ron were in awe that Hermione had shouted something like that, rather unprovoked. Ginny looked rather angry, but Draco thought it looked like her anger was directed at Hermione, and he couldn't be sure, it didn't seem right. Parvati and Colin had the same scared expression when they realized what Blaise was doing, only a split second before Draco and Hermione did.

"TAKE THAT BACK!" Blaise screamed at the top of her lungs, tossing the bludger in the air and swinging the beater's bat with all her might, right into Hermione's stomach. The formerly bushy haired girl went flying back, taking Seamus Finnegan, who happened to be standing behind her, with her.

Corrine, Lavender, and Parvati screamed. Joel dropped his broom and sprinted towards the group, Graham on his heels. Clarissa stayed back holding those trying out away from the scene. Harry ran over to Hermione, who had flown a great distance upon impact. Katie stared in shock at Blaise, whose hand was still in the air as she had it when she aimed the bludger at Hermione. Colin hid his face from Hermione and Seamus, as if he was scared to see what he would find. Ginny looked shocked but not totally surprised at Blaise. Ron, however, lunged himself at Blaise, but was stopped by Draco, who had shoved himself between the shocked stiff Blaise and the angry boyfriend.

"Let me at her!" He growled, Draco holding him back. Ron attempted to bite him on the arm, but missed when his little sister yanked him away from Draco and Blaise.

"You bloody moron! He didn't do anything!" Ginny yelled at him, smacking him upside the head. "Help your friend!"

Ron looked as if he had suddenly realized that Hermione would now need help if she was hurt. He and Ginny rushed over to where Harry was shaking Hermione and Lavender and Parvati were tending to Seamus's wounds.

"Blaise?" Corrine asked, touching her. She didn't move. If it wasn't for the tears silently streaming down her freckled face, Draco could have mistaken her for a statue. Her sad, secretive green eyes just stared at Hermione, while not really looking at her, but clearly seeing something else, something in her own little world, her memories, something that only she could see, something that she clearly didn't want to see.

"Blaise! Shh, it's okay," he said to her, pulling her protectively close to him. She loosened up, allowing Draco to put his arm around her, shielding her from the others.

"She's breathing!" Harry said, relieved.

"It takes a really cruel person to do that." Katie said icily. "I guess I have my answer about Blake don't I?"

Draco felt her tears on his robes. "That's not true. It wasn't my fault." She cried to Draco, who was not entirely sure what she was talking about.

"Yeah right, I'm supposed to believe that from the person that just tried to kill the smartest person in the school." Katie snapped, harshly as she walked away, following Ron and Harry who were helping Hermione to the hospital wing, Seamus and Lavender close behind them. Parvati and Colin followed suit, the only remaining Gryffindor lingered behind as if she wasn't sure which way to go. After a few long seconds, she followed the flashes of Colin's camera into the school.

"We probably better cancel try-outs." Graham suggested, indicating the twenty or so Slytherins standing back by Clarissa, eager to understand what they didn't witness.

"Yeah, I think that would be good." Joel said. "We should also find Professor Snape and tell him your side of the story before the Gryffindors go running off to McGonagall."

Blaise nodded but still seemed to be lost deep within her thoughts. Draco was supporting all her weight as she leaned against him, weak knees preventing her from standing on her own. He scooped her up the way a groom scoops up his new bride, and couldn't help but thinking of that very imagery. "It's okay," he whispered and for the first time since the blow-up, she looked like she was back in this world, her thoughts pushed aside for a second as she laid her head against Draco's shoulder.

"I'm scared." She whispered back, wrapping her arms tighter around his neck. "I didn't mean to. It just happened."

"She deserved it." Draco replied, glancing back to see Joel and Graham dismissing the Slytherin quidditch candidates.

"Then you believe me?" Blaise asked, looking up at him. "I don't want to be a Death Eater."

"Neither do I."

And that moment right there was the moment those two realized their mission; they were going to escape their pre-determined destinies; together.

* * *

Thanks for reading!

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Please, please, please review like the nice Lunarian Princess! I love reviews! Please make my day and send a review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	4. No Reason

Okay, first of all if you are reading this and you have not yet finished reading the Half-Blood Prince (Quite frankly I don't know why you'd be reading this and not the book, but I just wanted to be on the safe side), this little author's note has major **SPOILERS** for the sixth book in it. If you don't want to read the spoilers, you can just scroll on down to the song and hopefully enjoy the chapter. As you are well aware of, I started this story before the release of the sixth book, so the story will not align entirely with the premise of the new book.

First of all, the character of Blaise Zabini was developed and you will clearly note that he is absolutely nothing like the character I created in this story. When I started this story I did not know that JK Rowling had said that Blaise was a boy. The only Blaise I had ever heard of was a girl, so I assumed the same in this case. Really, it doesn't matter, even after the character development in the HBP, Blaise still seems like a character that if unmentioned, really wouldn't have any affect on the story what so ever. I am just adding this note to prevent future reviews that say "You know Blaise is a boy..." or "Blaise wasn't mentioned having a brother...". Although on this note, I want to make one clarification, I'd like to thank anonymous for telling me that Blaise was a guy, otherwise I wouldn't have found out until about two a.m. on Saturday morning when I was reading that part of the book. And reviews really are so appreciated and wonderful, I love reading them; I just didn't want them pointing out repeatedly that Blaise was a boy and that I was really quite stupid to not have picked up on that after reading HBP. (Yes, Kate, after reading HBP, I _did_ know Blaise was a boy, I'm not that slow!)

Secondly, Draco Malfoy's character has quite the adventure and twist of fate in this book and his new found behaviors change his character dramatically. When he is pressed with killing Dumbledore, he is unable to go through with it and he is extremely scared that something bad will happen to his mother. This new presented Draco does sort of align with the Draco in my story, Draco is shown to be able to love someone (okay, his mother, but still it shows Draco has some compassion like in my story) and his inability to turn to the Dark Side.

I have finished my story. Well, okay, I haven't finished the story but I had the plot drawn out and knew how the story would end when I started this story and I have no plans to change them. I am however still writing the story so small details from the sixth book could slip in, but nothing would be dramatic enough to change the ending. On this note, I am not saying that all of what happened in HBP won't happen in this story, I'm just saying that when I decided how to end this story, nothing from the sixth book was involved because obviously I hadn't read the sixth book when I started this story and any major plot twist that does happen is a result of sheer coincidence. I just quite frankly don't want to hear a review for my story that is simply going to tell me that my story doesn't quite match the book. I do however, still love reviews, even if they are to tell me that my idea for the story was dumb, my writing is poor, or that something in my story doesn't add up. Those reviews are constructive criticism and help me write better, informing me for the bazillionth time that my story doesn't follow the book is just telling me something that I already know and is not helping my writing. About half of this particular chaapter was written before I read HBP, and for now the only thing I think that will change with the story is the teachers. (i.e. Slughorn teaches potions, Snape teaches DADA)

On a final note, I just want to to thank you for taking the additional time to read my long-winded note and for hopefully taking the time to finish reading this chapter and for reviewing. I hope you enjoyed reading HBP as much as I did and I am sure you are hoping as much as I am that JK Rowling hurries up and publishes that seventh book.

* * *

_**All of us believe that this is not up to you**_

_**The fact of the matter is that it's up to me**_

_**How can we fake this anymore?**_

_**Turn our backs away and choose to just ignore**_

_**Some say its ignorance**_

_**It makes me feel some innocence**_

_**It takes away a part of me but I won't let go**_

_**Tell me why, can't you see it's not the way**_

_**When we all fall down it will be too late**_

_**Why is there no reason we can't change**_

_**When we all fall down who will take the blame**_

_**What will it take?**_

_**If nothing could ever be this real**_

_**A life unsatisfied that I could never feel**_

_**This future's not so bright**_

_**Some can't make the sacrifice**_

_**It's more than just black and white**_

_**And I won't follow……**_

_**No Reason by Sum 41**_

Blaise had been handed her punishment. Fifty points from Slytherin and an apology to Granger. McGonagall seemed to think that this was an awfully light punishment, but to any Slytherin, even for the outcast Slytherins, apologizing to Gryffindor was about one of the worst punishments that could be concocted; that and fraternizing with Hufflepuffs. Of course, Snape thought that the punishment for Hermione was too light as well, but McGonagall was firm in her stance that being whacked in the stomach with a bludger was punishment enough for whatever comments she made.

"So how did it go?" Draco asked, waiting outside the hospital wing for Blaise to return from making her apology.

"Fine." She answered, leading the way away from the dreary hospital wing.

"Fine?" Draco asked, catching up so that he was now walking along side her.

"Fine." She repeated, the corners of her mouth starting to twitch as if she wanted to smile.

"How is a conversation with Hermione Granger 'fine'?" he asked.

The twitch grew into a full on smile. "Well, she may have been asleep when I apologized."

Draco burst out laughing. "Are you serious?" he laughed even harder when Blaise nodded. "Why, we might just make a Slytherin out of you yet." He teased, Blaise playfully slapping him on the arm.

"Shut up or I'll hit you again." Blaise said, shaking her head, knowing that he knew that she was teasing him yet at the same time serious.

"Oh, I feel threatened," Draco laughed. "OW!"

Blaise smirked. "What can I say? I'm a girl of my word."

"I'll say." He muttered. Nearly two weeks had passed since that unfortunate incident that resulted in Hermione being hit in the stomach with a bludger, Seamus Finnegan messing up his elbow after falling to the ground, Draco having to carry Blaise off the field, and Blaise having to apologize to the most annoying girl, pardon Pansy Parkinson, in the school.

"Where is everyone?" Blaise asked when they reached the common room only to find it deserted with a mere glow in the fireplace.

"Zabini, it took you nearly four hours to apologize. Everyone else went to bed. It's nearly one in the morning. Were you hiding from her until she fell asleep?" Draco asked, only joking.

"Kinda." She answered, gracefully sitting down on the window seat. The window looked out over the big moonlit lake on the east side of the castle. She started out for a few seconds, clearly waiting for Draco to sit down next to her.

"I heard what she said. Was that why you hit her?" Draco whispered, finally asking the question he and Blaise both knew was inevitable and necessary.

She sighed and hugged her knees, her eyes focused on the lake the entire time. "I am not a Death Eater. I never will be."

Draco remained silent. It took so much to convince her talk, he wasn't about to interrupt her when she finally began to open up. "If you are that's your prerogative and I'm not about to convince you otherwise." She continued, sighing again. "Just know that I'm not a Death Eater. I am not a servant to Voldemort. My brother was never a servant to Voldemort. He was willing to die before becoming one."

"You-Know-Who killed your brother?" Draco asked, watching her watch the ripples in the lake.

"Voldemort, Draco. Voldemort." Blaise corrected him, her eyes finally focusing on him not the lake. "And yes, he did."

"Was Voldemort the reason you left after third year?" He asked, praying he wasn't tiptoeing on thin ice with her. It was hard to tell what Blaise considered crossing the line when talking to her. The more he talked to her, the harder and harder she became to read.

"Yes and no." Blaise answered, the green eyes once again shifting from Draco. "Blake wasn't the reason we left." She said, purposely failing to elaborate.

"Oh." He replied, remaining silent for what seemed like forever. "I don't want to be a Death Eater either." He added.

"Good. I didn't have to try and change your mind." Blaise said with a smirk.

"I thought you said it was my prerogative." Draco pointed out.

"I lied. My way is the only right way." She stated, dead serious.

"Well, I guess it's a good thing we agree."

"Yeah."

They remained silent for a few moments, Blaise watching a single snowy owl soaring across the night sky; its white feathers causing it to stand out against the dark clouds and dimming stars, Draco watching Blaise. He watched her eyes follow the owl across the forest, across the moon, skimming over the lake, soaring over the castle, making its way home.

He wondered if Blaise had a home. Of course she had a home, it wasn't like she lived at Hogwarts all the time, but was it like his home? Cold and lonely, the normally silent house punctuated by a few screaming matches and secretive plans formed between members of a particular dark society. Were her parents Death Eaters? Apart from the attempted murder of Hermione Granger, he really saw nothing in Blaise that made her a Slytherin. Was she a Slytherin like him? The reason behind being a Slytherin to prevent an explosion and disappointment from her parents? Was she destined to be a Death Eater too? But then there was that one question that would really distinguish the difference between the two of them. Was she brave enough to fight her destiny? He wasn't sure that he was. Not alone, anyway.

"You know, it's much more interesting to look out the window than to stare at me," Blaise teased, never removing her eyes from the window. Draco hated, yet admired, how she always seemed to know what was going on around her. He could tell she was going to be the type of mother children were annoyed with. You know the type, the ones with the eyes in the back of their heads. The ones that knew when you were daydreaming, not working on that potions report; the ones that knew you were the one who left the back door open that allowed the cat to escape, without ever even turning around. Those kind. Still great mums, just amazingly frustrating at times.

At that comment, Draco turned away, his face heating up, once again hating her for something. Blaise was so different from anyone else. Never had he teased and laughed like he did when he was with her. Never had he spent so much alone time with one person. Never had he been this close to one person. Naturally, Slytherins aren't group-people, they aren't touchy-feely, they aren't sappy; in other words they aren't Hufflepuffs. But with Blaise it was different. He had carried her several times, even sort of hugging her after the Hermione-Bludger Incident, as it would later be known as.

He waited a few seconds, staring out at the lake, before daring to look back at her. This time she had no comment, her head against the wall, her eyes glazed over as if she was in her own little world, her world of thoughts and secrets, a world Draco wondered if he was a part of. He took her dazed state to really look at her. Her dark coffee colored hair hung straight, about midway down her back. Though glazed over, her eyes were a brilliant emerald green that seemed only slightly clearer than the day he met her. Her skin was pale, adorned with a sprinkle of dark freckles. Her lips were tightly closed not in a smile, but not quite a frown, still giving the air of a sometimes saddened girl. This seemed to be her normal look. Lonely, closed mouth, pale cold skin, but brilliant green eyes that if you took a quick glance when she wasn't looking, had a distinct sparkle to them.

"You really don't support Voldemort?" She asked, still not blinking.

"I don't." He honestly answered, staring at the moonlight.

"I'll keep that in mind." She said softly with a tone that suggested to Draco that the thought of opening up to him may have, if only for an instant, crossed her mind.

The pair sat in silence for a few minutes longer, although it didn't really feel all that silent to Draco, he was sure Blaise could hear his heart pounding in his chest, it was that loud. But if she heard, she politely ignored it, just gazing out the window. "It's raining." She said, and sure enough the sky opened up and poured its contents out just as Blaise was starting to do with her heart.

Draco woke early the next morning to the sound of someone hammering. Still somewhat incoherent, it took him a second to realize that he had never made it to the dormitories the night before. He was sitting on the window seat, head against the window, but his late night conversation and observer was gone.

"Late night?" Joel asked, hammer in hand.

"Huh?" Draco asked, running his hand through his hair, trying to fix it.

"I came down twenty minutes ago and you were out." Joel commented, hopping over the common room sofa and plopping himself down.

"Have you seen Blaise?" Draco asked, unaware of the fact that Joel could perhaps take this comment the wrong way, as he obviously did.

"You were down here with Blaise all night?" Joel asked, his eyebrow raised in a true Slytherin fashion.

"Shut up!" Draco snapped, grumpily, after slowly catching on. "We were talking and I must've fallen asleep."

"You fell asleep while she was talking?" Joel laughed. "That's a sure way to win her over."

"We're just friends." Draco hissed.

"You'll be lucky if you're that if you fell asleep while she was talking." Joel snickered. "Dude, that's like relationship suicide."

"We had stopped talking and were just watching the rain….I think." Draco said, trying to recall what transpired him to fall asleep.

"Watching the rain? That sounds like such a girly thing to do." Joel replied.

"Hello? Did you not hear me? I was sitting with a girl!" Draco snapped. "And what's with the hammer?"

"I posted the quidditch team roster." He replied, pointing to the common room message board. Notes full of _Gryffindor is for Losers!_ and _Prefects Meeting: 7pm on the 13th_ and various others filled the board but right in the center was:

**Slytherin Quidditich Roster:**

**Captain: **Joel Pritchard, 7th year

**Chasers**: Joel Pritchard, 7th year

Clarissa Hawthorne, 7th year

Graham Pritchard, 3rd year

**Seeker: **Draco Malfoy, 6th year

**Beaters:** Jesse Green, 5th year

Blaise Zabini, 6th year

**Keeper:** Jamie Hart, 5th year

**Quidditch Captain Roster**

**Gryffindor:** Harry Potter, 6th year, Seeker

**Hufflepuff: **Eric Cadwallader, 7th year, Keeper

**Ravenclaw:** Cho Chang, 7th year, Seeker

**Slytherin: **Joel Pritchard, 7th year, Chaser

"Somebody made Cadwallader a captain?" Draco asked. "Oh, Eric, I was thinking Erin. I was going to say, Erin's only a fifth year, fifth years are never captains when they are older players."

"What do you think about our team?" Joel asked, looking for Draco's response. Since he received none, it was clear to him that Draco had not looked at it, because if Draco had read it, he surely would have had a response.

"BLAISE? She didn't even try out!" Draco pointed out.

"You don't want me on the team?" A voice behind him rang out.

"No, I mean, that's just got to be some kind of record or something. The only person that got on a quidditch team without trying out." Draco said, saving his butt.

"Nope, I'm not. Potter was picked for seeker without ever trying out." Blaise pointed out, plopping onto the sofa next to Joel.

"Potter's first for freaking everything." Draco muttered, hating the Boy Who Lived once again.

"Well, you're a beater. That's cool." Draco said.

Blaise looked at the watch fastened around her right wrist and stood up, claiming she had something to do. Draco didn't find her until much later that evening as he was finishing up his dinner when she came dashing into the Great Hall with only ten minutes of dinnertime left.

"Where have you been?" he asked, knowing very well that two pairs of eyes, besides his, were focused on the green eyed, out of breath girl.

"Bugger off and listen to someone else's conversation." Blaise snapped at Pansy and Millicent. Millicent tried to argue that she wasn't listening, but Pansy didn't give a damn whether or not Blaise knew that she was eavesdropping. "I'm thirsty." Blaise said to Draco, picking up his glass and sipping from up.

"Of course, you can have some of mine," he muttered, but only teasing. Blaise, knowing this, gave no response other than the downing of Draco's beverage.

"Chocolate milk?" Blaise asked, one eyebrow raised. "The choice beverage of six year olds?"

"Hey," Draco said defending himself. "I don't want to grow up and become a caffeine addict like you yet."

"I am not a caffeine addict." Blaise retorted, taking a new cup from the center of table and pouring whatever was in the pitcher into it.

"Says the girl that drinks coffee every chance she gets."

"I do no-" Blaise stopped, becoming aware that she was holding a mug of coffee.

"Oh look, who was right. I was right and Blaise Zabini was wrong. This has been the very day I've been waiting for-" He stopped short, noticing that Blaise was not paying the slightest bit of attention to him.

"You know that your lack of annoyed-ness is really spoiling my gloating." Draco muttered.

"Huh? What?" Blaise asked, no longer focusing on whatever was going on at the Gryffindor table.

"Never mind." He replied, looking down at his half eaten sandwich rather than at her.

" 'kay " She said absentmindedly.

"So……quidditch?" He said, phrasing it more like a question, although he really didn't have one. He just wanted to fill the awkward silence.

"Yeah!" Blaise said, her eyes lighting up. "I meant to ask you if you wanted to go flying later tonight. I'm a little rusty."

"Sure." Draco said, glad the silence was over.

"Great. I'll meet you at the quidditch pitch at seven thirty, 'kay?" She said, barely waiting for him to answer her with a nod of the head. She snatched her books off the bench next to her and took off in a mad dart out of the hall leaving him with two half empty glasses, one of chocolate milk and one of coffee.

"So, where'd your new best buddy go?" A shrill voice behind him asked, the voice's hand clamping him on the shoulder.

"Go away," he muttered, quite frankly not having the enthusiasm to deal with Pansy Parkinson at the moment.

"You know, you've really changed." Pansy shouted as he walked away. A few of the neighboring Ravenclaws turned to stare. Draco recognized one; Ginny Weasley's strange friend, Luna Lovegood. "And that is not a good thing."

Draco kept walking, now slightly annoyed with the knowledge that Pansy and the Ravenclaws were staring.

"Are you even listening to me?" Pansy asked, a furious note in her voice.

Draco answered her question for her, his response was a mere disappearance around the corner of the Great Hall, out of sight.

"Change isn't always bad you know." A different voice said. Luna Lovegood's voice to be exact. Draco couldn't ever remember hearing her talk. All he could think about was the fact that she used to wear radishes as earrings. Talk about weird.

"Where did you come from?" Draco asked, now realizing that she instantly appeared at his side and he was sure that he saw her still sitting at the Ravenclaw table when he left the Great Hall. She wasn't out of breath, she couldn't have run.

"Do you really want me to explain it to you?" She asked him, with a smirk that suggested that she was a little more clued in than she led people to believe.

"Um, no, that's quite all right." Draco replied, a little taken back by the unusually blunt girl.

"Change isn't always bad." She repeated, not at all shy about talking to a stranger.

"Do you even know me?" He asked, pretty much ignoring her comments.

"I don't know about you. But I know you." She explained.

"Well, that just clears it up." Draco muttered under his breath.

"I know that you don't quite understand why you are changing your ways. I know that you aren't sure if it's a good thing or not. I know that you hold many secrets, secrets that you don't want anyone to know yet at the same time you are dying to tell someone." She said, hugging her book to her chest. Draco noted that her earrings actually seemed normal; a pair of turquoise dangling earrings.

"And how did you become an expert at reading people?" Draco asked, subtly admitting that everything she said was true.

"It's in the eyes. You can always sense secrets in the eyes." She said, looking him directly in the eyes. Draco tensed up at hearing these words. They were the words he thought when he first met Blaise. Her eyes held secrets. Luna's eyes held secrets and now he knew that his eyes held secrets.

"People notice change." Luna told him, shaking her head, her earrings jangling. Was that her way of changing? Her earrings?

"Yeah, they do." He agreed, shaking his head. Was he actually talking to a Ravenclaw and not minding it? Weird.

"LUNA!"

Both Draco and Luna turned around to see Ginny Weasley running towards them, her book bag hitting her leg with each step she took."Ouch, ouch, Luna, you won't believe what happened- Malfoy?"

Clearly, she had only just noticed that he was standing there with her now radish-free friend. But she didn't say his name like the rest of the Dream Team did. She didn't say it to be mean or insuitiating, she was just calling him by his name. Weird.

"Nice to meet you Malfoy," Luna said, turning and extending her hand. Draco shook it, completely bewildered.

"What are you two doing?" Ginny asked.

"Discussing change." Luna answered before Draco could. "We decided we like it."

Ginny looked at Draco, giving him a look that clearly suggested that even though Luna was her friend she still did not understand some of her ways. Draco just shrugged.

"Apparently we like change." Draco replied, more to Ginny than to Luna because by now Luna seemed to have drifted away from her insightful self back to her day dreaming self. Change is a slow process.

"Well, your choice of conversationalists certainly is a change." Ginny commented, clearly still a little confused about the whole situation.

"Yeah, she's cool" Draco answered honestly.

"Well, I'll be off now. Promised to show Neville the latest article so he would learn that Hermione Granger isn't always right. The Crumple Horned Snorkack is real!" Luna said, not really waiting for a response before darting off down the hall towards the forgetful boy.

"Well, that comment right there just earns her way more cool points." Draco said, causing Ginny to laugh. He hadn't meant to, but it was nice. Wait, did he say it was nice?

"I have to admit that I would've predicted that you'd be friends with Ron before you'd be chatting with Luna."

"Oh, you didn't hear? I'm on my way to meet him for tea," Draco smirked, Ginny laughed a little and then seemed to question why she was enjoying this conversation just the way Draco was questioning himself.

The two remained in awkward silence for a few seconds before they both tried to break the uncomfortableness by talking rather than just running away, "Quidditch?" they both asked in unison.

The laughed awkwardly. Ginny tucked a piece of fiery red hair behind her ear, "Chaser." She answered, nodding her head.

"Seeker."

"I figured that." Ginny replied quickly. Why was he sticking around to talk to her? Both of them clearly knew that this was an uncomfortable situation, yet neither one was willing to be the one to break away They weren't arguing, they weren't hating each other verbally, so it wasn't like either wasn't leaving because they didn't want to be the one to run scared from a fight. So, they kept walking, they kept talking, unsure of what was holding them together, unsure of why they couldn't seem to part.

"Well, I'm headed down this way." Draco said when the pair reached an intersection of the long lonely halls.

Ginny's face blushed, but only the tiniest bit. "So am I," She replied rather softly for her,both of them noting that their plan to separate didn't work.

"Oh, well, let's keep going then." Draco answered, slightly embarrassed.

Draco cast a glance at Ginny out of the corner of his eye. She was staring at her knees, clearly trying to avoid her bag from hitting them; she didn't want to wince in pain in front of him. He could understand that; no one liked to show even the slightest sign of weakness. She was strikingly beautiful without trying; porcelain skin marked only by freckles, warm brown sparkling eyes with dark lashes, rather tall and athletically fit, and fiery red hair pulled in a ponytail with a green ribbon. Green, an interesting choice of color on her part...

"Green?" He asked, motioning to her ribbon.

Ginny looked up as if she could see it, when it would be obvious to even Crabbe and Goyle that if you looked up, you'd still be unable to see the back of your head. "Oh," She said, it suddenly dawning on her that this color of ribbon could be deemed traitorous to her own house. "It matches my favorite sweater."

"Oh."

"So, why are we talking?" Ginny asked, kind of laughing.

"Um," Draco replied, straining to remember why. "Luna."

"Ah, Luna." Ginny said.

"She's...uh, different." Draco said, not quite sure why other than to keep the silence from returning.

"That's one way to describe her." Ginny replied. "How did you start talking to her?"

"She just appeared right next to me, babbling that change wasn't bad after Pansy shouted that I changed!" Draco said, eager to actually have something to say, making this conversation less painful.

"She doesn't talk a lot, but when she does it's normally pretty insightful." Ginny said, nodding. "Or pretty stupid. Stupid or insightful, never in between."

"So, I've noticed."

"I mean, the whole Crumple Horned Snorkack thing-"

"-what exactly is a Crumple Horned Snorkack?"

"I have no idea! Something that her father thinks exists and that she is dead set on proving to Hermione, who of course, love her to death, but is a complete skeptic when it comes to anything without documented proof from a credited book."

"I think I have heard something of this though, I just never knew what it was-"

"Ever read the Quibbler?"

"LIke I'd willing admit something as embarrassing as that." Draco smirked, barely noticing the now fast paced flow of their conversation, it was coming, well...naturally.

"Well, the name of the editor is Lovegood-"

"No! Loony is an editor?"

Ginny looked like she was going to explode with laughter. "You cannot possibly be that stupid."

"Luna's not the editor? But you said Lovego- _oh._ Her father is."

"Okay, Luna isn't even _that_ blonde." Ginny said, still laughing.

"Wait, I just made a mistake. I wasn't thi-" He stopped, abruptly when Ginny stopped laughing and walking. He looked at her and then followed her gaze straight to Dean Thomas.

Dean was standing there, arms folded over his chest, just staring at the pair with an icy glare. The strap of his messenger bag crossed directly over the Gryffindor patch on his vest, his dark eyes lingered on the Slytherin patch on Draco's cloak. This was not going to be good.

"Dean!" Ginny called, leaving Draco's side and running over to Dean, placing her hands on his arm and kissing him. So, she had a boyfriend. Draco didn't find this information surprising. She was pretty and witty and popular. An ideal girlfriend. Not for someone like him, of course, he certainly wasn't thinking that, it's just- she was pretty.

Dean didn't respond to Ginny's kiss. He kept looking between Draco and Ginny, as if trying to decide who to accuse first. Ginny took his hand and tried to pull him down the intersecting hall, but Dean remained in his place in front of the outside entrance to the path to the quidditch pitch. The quidditch pitch where Draco was supposed to be meeting Blaise. Where was she?

Ginny tried to make Dean move again. His eyes were now fixed on Draco, his cold calculating eyes. In fact, Dean Thomas looked downright murderous. "Deeaann..." Ginny hissed, trying to break his stare. She was unsuccessful, but Blaise was not.

"Draco! You left your broom in your dorm but I brought it." Blaise said to him, holding two sleek racing brroms. "What are you doing?" She asked, before noticing the Gryffindors, the red haired girl and the red faced boy. "Hello." She added after noticing them when Draco didn't reply.

Dean grumbled something under his breath and with Ginny still attached to his hand, he rounded the corner where the four stood. "What were you doing with him?" Draco heard Dean say as soon as they started walking. "In case you didn't notice that's Malfoy."

"I noticed, Dean." Ginny huffed.

"He's a Slytherin. And a Malfoy. Malfoy is in Slytherin. Do you not realize that? And what's with this ribbon?" Dean interrogated her. Blaise and Draco stood still in their places, unable to not hear Dean's accusations. He was as loud as he was upset. In other words, he was shouting.

"Shuh!" Ginny said, looking at him. "We were just talking."

"You were talking to MALFOY?" Dean harped, stopping in his tracks. The couple seemed to have forgotten the pair of Slytherins that were still in earshot, only a few yards away. Both Blaise and Draco knew that moving at this point would draw unwanted attention upon themselves, perhaps coaxing an explosion from Dean. Draco always thought that Seamus Finnegan, Dean's best friend, was the fiery, hot-headed one of the pair, but clearly the Gryffindors were two of a kind.

"So was Luna!" Ginny said as if this made all the difference. Draco doubted that this comment would calm Dean. He doubted a heavy dose of Calming Potion would calm Dean.

"You were with Malfoy! Ron would agree with me when I say he's no good!"

"You know, you didn't value Ron's opinion too much last week when you kissed me good morning at breakfast."

"That was different."

"Really? 'Cause I think my brother was the same person last week that he is today."

"It was different and you know it. You're my girlfriend, I'm allowed to kiss you. Ron was being stupid. This is you being stupid. Fraternizing with a git like Malfoy. STUPID!"

"I am being stupid? Way to talk to "you're girlfriend"!" Ginny hissed, no longer worried about quieting Dean. "I was just talking to him! It's not like we're friends! We were just talking!"

The last comment hit Draco. Not friends? Well of course not, he realized after thinking about it. He didn't even know why this comment hit him like it did. It wasn't a blow really, it just caught his attention. Really. Okay, now he was ready to drop it. Really.

"Fine." Dean grumbled and put his arm around her shoulder, but it was quite obvious that neither was particularly happy with the other.

Ginny sighed and adjusted her bag as it was still hitting her when she walked. Dean took the bag and the two disappeared up the staircase.

Blaise glanced at him as if to ask how she should even begin to try and understand what she had just witnessed.

"So.." she started to say.

"Thanks," Draco said, taking his sleek black and silver broom out of her hand.

"No problem." She answered. "So, let me get this straight - you were talking to Ginny Weasley?"

Draco opened the door to the outside. It was chilly, the air was crisp and brisk; Draco loved the autumn air. "Well, I was talking to Luna and then Ginny came-"

"You were talking to Luna?" Blaise asked with a smile. "Lovegood?"

"Do you know any other Luna?" He retorted. "Anyway, Pansy told me that I had changed and then Luna appeared out of nowhere, babbling about how change was a good thing and then Ginny showed up to talk to Luna and then Luna left and I was stuck with Ginny and we were walking cause I had to meet you here and she was headed in the same direction when we ran into Dean and you saw the rest."

"So, you just spent the evening walking around with one girl after another, did you?" Blaise teased. "First a Ravenclaw, then a Gryffindor, now a Slytherin. When is your date with a Hufflepuff?"

"Funny. Not." Draco said, opening the door to the pitch.

"Ooh, is it Hannah Abbott, she's cute, huh?" Blaise laughed. "Maybe Susan Bones?"

"All right, I get it, very cute," Draco replied, but Blaise wasn't finished.

"Oh, how 'bout Erin Cadwallader? She likes quidditch, you have something in common-"

"Has anyone ever told you that you are annoying?"

"Oh, I know it's Rose Zeller!"

"Who?"

"Rose Zeller: petite girl, dark brown hair, blue eyes, hyper, second year."

"You think I'd have a date with a second year?"

"Well, you two would have the same maturity level..."

"Very funny, Zabini, very funny."

"Thank you, I'll be here all week..."

And their witty banter continued well into dusk. They flew around the pitch several times and then tossed the quaffle around, Draco realizing that he was quite glad that he hadn't chosen to try out for chaser; it was quite hard to catch the quaffle and stay on the broom. Later, they released one of the bludgers and batted it back and forth, Blaise, a considerably better player than Draco.

"So how did you manage it?" Draco asked, smacking the bludger away after it was a little too close for comfort.

"Manage what?" Blaise asked, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. The wind picked up and blew it again. A storm was brewing. The only question was when it would hit. It was too early to tell.

"Becoming beater." Draco asked.

"Well, Joel saw me whack that bludger at Granger, so that pretty much proved I could player beater." Blaise said, giving Draco a look for even having to ask.

"I know _that_, I meant how did you get away with becoming a beater? Surely, there is a rule against injuring guilty spectators?" He asked.

"On a mere technicality. I wasn't on the quidditch team when I hurt her, so Madam Hooch couldn't penalize me for a quidditch infraction. If I had been on the team, I would have been suspended from the team for at least a year, maybe longer."

"There's a loophole in every law."

"Isn't that what we all count on?"

"Well, I'm glad you're on the team."

"Me too. McGonagall wasn't though. She tried to overturn Joel's ruling but Madam Hooch said since I wasn't a quidditch player it was up to the Head of House and Snape said I could play just so he could see the look on McGonagall's face."

"I'm sure Snape let you play because you deserve to, not because he simply wanted to piss McGonagall off."

"Have you been to our DADA class? Snape doesn't like me." Blaise pointed out, aiming the bludger at the center hoop. It contacted it and a loud metal clang rang out.

"He just doesn't call on you much."

"Draco,he avoids me like you avoid muggles."

"Well, muggles are just annoying."

"Believe me. He doesn't like me."

"Why?"

At this Blaise remained silent, it seemingly dawned upon her that she should have dropped the issue had she wanted to avoid answering the questioning. It was too late now. The sky rumbled overhead.

"Promise, you won't tell anyone anything I say?" She asked, placing the bludger back in the box and then kicked off the ground again to about ten feet above where Draco was hovering.

"Well, I do have this date with a Hufflepuff later and if we run out of coversation topics - okay, I get it, not the time, yeah, I promise."

"My parents are pretty much some of Voldemort's closest supporters. They always have been. It's just they've never been connected with anything, so we didn't really have any trouble until a few years ago." She stopped to take a breath.

"I'm not entirely sure of what all transpired between them, but my parents and Snape never got along. My mother said he wasn't to be trusted. She said that he was too close to Dumbledore. Now, Voldemort trusts him, so Voldemort didn't like hearing the my mother doesn't trust Snape, implying that she doesn't trust him in a way. My parents quickly explained that this wasn't what they meant and they tried to defend themselves. Snape is good at Occulmency. Voldemort is good at Occulmency. But Dumbledore is the best at Occulmency. She pointed out that Dumbledore would know, Dumbledore always knows. Snape tried to say that Dumbledore always gives people a second chance, at which point my mother said he only got that second chance because he denied that he was involved with Voldemort, something she and my father had never done."

"That really must've upset him." Draco said, amazed at how much Blaise seemed to know. She gave the impression that she wasn't actually present at this argument, so someone must have told her, probably her mother. Which then occured to Draco that her mother would have only told her if she trusted her because she thought they were on the same side. Which means that Blaise was able to fool her mother, a highly powerful Dark Witch. If Blaise's mother had spoken directly with Voldemort before his return to power, then the Zabinis really were among the strongest, darkest of them all. And Blaise could fool them, making her perhaps, even stronger than both of them?

"Yeah. They didn't really talk unless they had to. Then the whole thing with Sorcerer's Stone. Snape had ample amounts of time to steal that stone and yet he never did. My parents questioned his motives again, convincing some of the other Death Eaters that they were right. If they wanted Voldemort back to power they would have to do something. So my mother mentioned the diary. Then they needed to choose a target."

"Ginny Weasley." Draco whispered, so drawn in to Blaise's story. She knew so many more details than him; it was like he was there.

"That's the one. They spents weeks deliberating. Your father was involved too. She was perfect. Voldemort was quite happy when my mother told him. What better a person to open the chamber than the Heir of Gryffindor? Of course, I'm not sure Ginny knows, I know it took our parents a long time to figure out exactly who was a descendent to the founders and who was an heir, because they are very different things. Apparently, with whatever information they found, they had little doubt that Ginny was indeed at least strongly connected to Grodic Gryffindor. Something about her being heir; she was special. I don't remember all the details, I was twelve, but anyway she was an heir not just a descendent because of her powers. They agreed that something was to be said about her being the only female Weasley in many, many generations. That and she was pure-blood and my mother said she could just see it in her. And that I think is the most powerful information yet. My mother has always had a gift for being able to point out the strong wizards and witches even when they aren't demonstrating their powers. Something about their auras."

Blaise paused for a second. The sky rumbled again. "Anyway, I'm getting off topic. They were thrilled with the idea of bringing Voldemort to life via this book. My parents were favs again. Snape was supposed to slip Ginny the book, he was the Death Eater with the easiest opportunity. Just slip it into her school bag during class. Easy enough. Well, he forgot the book. Left it at your manor. Your father ended up finding an opportunity to give it to her, but the fact that Snape forgot the most important piece of the plan, really alerted my mother."

"That's why Father came to Diagon Alley that day." Draco said, now realizing why his father came on a trip that was usually reserved for just him and his mother.

"Maybe" Blaise replied, swallowing nervously. "When the plan fell through, Voldemort was really weak. Some Death Eaters blamed Snape, twice now plans at Hogwarts had failed when he was at Hogwarts 24/7. My mother was the one who led the protest. They wanted a different spy for Hogwarts. My mother argued that Snape couldn't be trusted. He had obivous connections to the Death Eaters and yet Dumbledore trusted him to teach? She thought they were being played. Snape told them very little information about Dumbledore and this Order thing, and whatever he did tell them was rather useless apparently. My mother wanted him to resign as potions master. My parents have never been accused, formally or informally, of being Death Eaters unlike Snape. So, it was their reasoning that if Snape resigned, my mother could apply for the job as potions master. Dumbledore would have no reason not to trust her. Snape didn't want to. He swore that he was loyal. Of course, this wasn't enough for my parents."

The sky roared, the winds picked up. Blaise lowered her broom, so she was closer to the ground. It was getting harder to stay on the broom. Draco wanted to suggest going inside but he knew that if he mentioned it now, Blaise might not finish opening up, she might think bettter of it and once again leave him in the dark. He lowered his altitude to match hers. "By that time, the only other open staff position had been filled. They couldn't use an adult. They needed a student. I heard these deliberations by eavesdropping. The ones that didn't trust Snape, Voldemort slowly going to this group but not there, were in my house talking, all of the children of death eaters potential choices. They ruled out most of them rather quickly, Claire Colt, Corrine's older sister was loyal but cracked under even the mention of torture, Emile Hershey had an accident with a memory charm when he was little, his parents bewitched him after he witnessed a murder on their part and has been extremely forgetful ever since. Lance Claiborne tended to stray from following procedure; Audrey Lee's parents' loyalty was questionable at best; Crabbe and Goyle are too stupid to actually notice details; Rachel Henson tends to talk to much if you know what I mean; Marcus Flint's loyalty can be bought, by either side, Clarissa Hawthorne is a little too blonde to get some things; Joel Pritchard's admiration of quidditch captain Flint could be risky, they thought he might let details slip for a spot on the team and a recommendation as captain for the next year. So that left five choices."

"Five?" Draco repeated, unable to think of even one.

"Five." Blaise said. "Phoenix Sommer, a second year at the time, Leonardo Taylor, a first year, Blake, a sixth year, Me, a third year, and you."

"Me?"

"You."

"Wow." This was the first time he had heard of this.

"Well, quite frankly if your child was chosen as important enough to be a spy for Voldemort, then that must be something. I remember Leonardo's dad and Phoenix's dad practically screaming that their child would be better, the fighting almost become messy."

"They decided on Blake, didn't they?" Draco asked, knowing the answer.

Blaise shook her head. "They decided on me. My mother thought I was more trustworthy than Blake. Leonardo was too young, he knew nothing of the school. Phoenix was more interested in boys and beauty potions than anything that remotely resembled work. It came down to me or you. They suspected that Dumbledore would be less suspicious of me because he was less suspicious of my parents. At the time, I really didn't have any issues with it, I was invisible as it was, it shouldn't have been too hard to sneak around unnoticed. But Blake wouldn't let me do it. He said it was wrong, it was sick how my parents just followed Voldemort's words like he was a god. He wasn't going to do it and he wasn't going to let me either. Blake was my best friend. The person I trusted most in the whole world. If he said it was wrong, then I believed him. He knew of Voldemort's plans to rise again. And his mistake was that he didn't hide it. He threatened to tell the whole world because he wasn't going to be labeled as a 'mindless death eater'. My parents tried to silence him but Voldemort learned that he knew. Voldemort was furious that his Death Eaters weren't being secretive and secure enough in their discussions and plans. Then Blake made some comment about knowing secrets about Voldemort, something that not even all of his Death Eaters knew, after all, he had not officially come back yet because he did not have a body. Only select Death Eaters, the few that could be entirely trusted, could hear his voice. Some guy named Worm something or other made sure of that. Anyway, Blake had apparently told him that he knew about the Triwizard Tournament and would foil the plan, he would be the school champion and prevent him from coming back. Wormtail killed him on Voldemort's order."

The tears were streaming down Blaise's face at this point but she continued on. "My parents now had to do some serious butt kissing to make up for Blake. They didn't mention him ever again, he was erased. Their plans for me as a spy were dropped. They began to focus on you instead, but clearly nothing ever came of it. That summer, my father announced that we had to move, he had a new job. He was sent to look for missing Death Eater suspected wizards for the Ministry. I didn't go back to Hogwarts, my parents were still embarrassed by the Blake incident. The Ministry said that I could stay with them on the grounds that I was still traumatized about my brother's "suicide" and they wanted to keep an eye on me. LIke Blake would've wasted his life by committing suicide. Some of the wizards he found were sent to Voldemort, some went to the Ministry after their minds were wiped clean of Voldemort related information. After they found all that were suspected to be in North America, we came back to Ireland. The Ministry now deemed me okay to attend school, so here I am."

The tears were now heavier. Draco pulled her into a hug as the sky opended up and poured out it's contents just as Blaise had done with her heart. They both just stood there, soaking in the details, details which could potentially drown them.

* * *

Thank you so much for reading!

Special Thanks to:

Sao & Anni: I'm glad that you think it is believable. I mean, I didn't think there would be too many Slytherins, but I didn't want to go introducing too many new characters that weren't really relevant to the plot. Thanks so much for reading this story too!

Dolface456: Thank you so much for reading and reviewing!

Anonymous: Thank you for that bit of information. I had no idea! I just knew of a girl named Blaise so I assumed. You know what they say when you assume...anyway, thanks for reading!

Please, please review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	5. I'd Do Anything

Disclaimer: I don't own Draco Malfoy and company or the song "I'd Do Anything" . I know, it came as a big shock to me too...

Author's Note: Thanks once again for the reviews!

* * *

Chapter Five

_I'd do anything  
Just to hold you in my arms  
To try to make you laugh  
Cause somehow I can't put you in the past  
I'd do anything  
Just to fall asleep with you  
Will you remember me?  
Cause I know  
I won't forget you _

I close my eyes  
And all I see is you  
I close my eyes  
I try to sleep  
I can't forget you  
And I'd do anything for you

I'd do anything  
Just to hold you in my arms  
To try to make you laugh  
Cause somehow I can't put you in the past  
I'd do anything  
Just to fall asleep with you

_I'd Do Anything by Simple Plan  
_

"Morning!"

"AHHH!" Draco screamed, startled beyond belief.

"AHHH!" She screamed back. Draco guessed he startled her. Well, good. She shouldn't wake people up like that.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked, it taking a second to register who was sitting less than six inches from the pillow in which his head was buried.

"To wake you up." Blaise laughed. "Mission successful, if I say so myself."

"Was it also part of your mission to scare ten years off my life?" Draco snapped, unable to sit up yet as he was still half asleep and dead tired.

"No, I think your constant worrying is responsible for that." She replied honestly before placing her hands on his shoulder and trying to shake him awake.

"Let me sleep!" He moaned. How was she even in his dorm? Boys certainly weren't allowed on the girls' dorms, why were the girls allowed in his? Did Pansy Parkinson know this? She mustn't or else she would constantly be up here, bugging him to death. Draco hoped she wouldn't find out.

"Joel wants us up early so we will be awake today." She said, still shaking him by his shoulder.

"Why does Joel want me up?" he moaned into his pillow. His soft, comfortable pillow which he hoped to remain with the rest of the morning at least.

"Uh, how about that big Gryffindor vs. Slytherin game he's been freaked out about for weeks now?" Blaise said, Draco, even though he couldn't see her, knew she had one perfectly arched eyebrow.

"That's today?"

"Yes, seeker, it is. Have you not seen the big countdown Joel has posted on the wall over here?" Blaise asked, motioning to the humongous poster Joel had pinned to the dungeon wall.

"I try to avoid Joel's side of the room as much as possible." He muttered into his pillow. "It's messy."

"Well, I'm sorry, but you are just freakishly clean." Blaise replied, glancing around his room. "These are hard standards to live up to."

"I am not _freakishly_ clean." He argued. "I just like order."

"Some might say that you're obssessed with order."

"And by some you mean you?"

"I can probably get Joel to back me up on this."

"Well, he's messy."

"I think we established that. Someone needs to wake up."

"Someone needs to let me go back to sleep."

"Come on, get up." Blaise pleaded, now her hands were on his forearm, she was still trying to shake him awke. "Please?"

"No." He muttered grumpily, burrowing his head deeper in his pillow as if that would really drown out the sound of Blaise talking. Draco was really beginning to hate morning people.

Blaise remained silent. Draco was just beginning to get suspicious when wham, his head slammed onto the mattress and his green pillowcased pillow was in the hands of the green eyed brown haired witch standing next to his night table.

"Now that is just cruel." He snapped.

"No," Blaise laughed. "But this is," and with that she whacked him with his own pillow.

Draco couldn't believe how much Blaise seemed to flucuate. Only a few weeks ago, she was pouring her heart out to him in the wake of a storm and she was happy as could be, playful and energetic now. She amazed him in a way he couldn't explain.

"Hey!" He groaned, finally getting up and desperately trying to find a pillow to hit her back. Unfortunately they were all out of reach. Fortunately, he remembered that he was a wizard.

"_Accio pillow!"_

"Oh, that is so cheating!" Blaise laughed, plopping herself down at the foot of his bed, still laughing.

"The game is really today?" Draco asked, dead tired.

"Yes!" Blaise said with a smile, so she wasn't exactly going with the I'm-dead-serious-approach but going with the I'm-dead-serious-but-you-are-being-hopelessly-stupid-so-it's-hilarious-approach. "I'm quite surprised that Joel didn't wake you up. Last time I saw him, he was trying to wake Clarissa up by shouting from the bottom of the girls dormitory stairs. She's still asleep but most every other female Slytherin is up and if Joel wasn't so darn adorable, they might just be mad at him."

"You think Joel is adorable?" Draco repeated, this comment catching his attention.

"Ha! I knew that would grab your attention." Blaise smirked, standing up. "Now, you have five minutes to get dressed. Meet me downstairs. If the fifth minute rolls around and you aren't there, I will come back with reinforcements, also known as Pansy and Millie. I'm sure they would love the tid-bit that girls can go into the boys dormitories. Honestly, I'm surprised they've been here this long and haven't figured it out."

"You wouldn't." Draco said, staring at her.

Again, she smirked like a true Slytherin. "Try me."

"Give me five minutes." He grumbled, his head falling back on his mattress, no pillow to catch his fall.

"Three seconds to spare, nice." Blaise teased when Draco finally came down the stairs in his Slytherin uniform.

"Would you have honestly gotten Pansy and Millicent?" He asked as they left the Slytherin common room and moved into the dungeon hallway.

"Do you think I honestly would have talked to them unless forced to?" She replied.

"I didn't think you would!" He said, suddenly quite grumpy because he lost several minutes of extra sleep because he was gullible. Damn his gullibilty.

"Finally!" Joel said as Blaise and Draco sat down with the rest of the quidditch team at breakfast.

"Breakfast just started." Draco replied, still not awake and still not happy about being awake.

"Shut up. He made me come down here before breakfast even started." Clarissa grumbled, her head resting on her arms on the wooden table. She never even looked up to grumble.

"Okay. The Gryffindor team is like this, Harry is seeker." Joel said, to the four members of his quidditch team who were actually awake. Only one of these four was actually paying attention, Draco noted that only Blaise seemed to listen. Jamie and Jesse were sitting across from each other, Jamie was next to Joel, and they were both clearly cross about something. Graham was awake but was busy swirling the syrup around on his waffle to actually notice Joel's game plan which now involved the use of the salt and pepper shakers, the bottle of syrup, several utensils, and a coffee cup as quidditch players in their various positions, a game plan that only made sense to Joel himself and no one else. "Ginny Weasley, Katie Bell, and Seamus Finnigan are chasers. Two guys, Peakes and Thomas, are beaters and Ron Weasley is the keeper again. I think we may actually have a shot. Are any of you actually listening to me?" he snapped, realizing that now he had no one's attention. The response he got, however, was much more than he bargained for.

"I can't remember where I left my quidditch robes." Blaise said, thinking out loud.

"I cannot believe that you were going to ask Corrine out." Jamie hissed.

"Well, it's obvious that she likes me more than she likes you!" Jesse snapped.

"Uh, the only way she would like you more is if she was hit on the head with a bludger!"

"Hey, this is no time for fighti-" but Joel was unable to finish his statement.

"GRAHAM!"

"I am so sorry! I swear I didn't mean to spill the syrup Clarissa!"

"CLEAN IT UP!"

"Corrine likes me better!"

"Draco, did I leave them in the team room from practice?"

"Okay, Corrine batted her eyes at me at the quidditch try-outs. Ask Blaise."

"Ask Blaise what?"

"Blaise, you lost your robes? We have a game in less than two hours!" Joel yelped.

"Graham clean the syrup up! It's in my hair!"

"You shouldn't have let your hair fall on the table!"

"JUST CLEAN IT UP!"

"I can't remember the spell!"

"Then invent one!"

"Why would Corrine like you?"

"Well she went with me to Hogsmeade last year!"

"She went with me too!"

"Graham, the syrup!"

"I'm trying, Clarissa!"

"They're in my trunk!"

"What's in your trunk?"

"My robes."

"CORRINE COLT LIKES ME!"

"Well, this ought to make beating you guys a whole lot easier." An unwelcome voice laughed.

"Yeah, doesn't look like teamwork." Dean Thomas added to Katie's comment. Dean looked at Draco, and if looks could kill, Draco would have died twelve times over. Clearly, Dean wasn't over the Talking-With-Ginny-Weasley Incident.

"Scourgify." Hermione said with the wave of her wand, vanishing the syrup that was in Clarissa's hair and on Graham's sleeves. She didn't do it to be nice though, Draco could tell, it was purely a superiority thing.

Jesse and Jamie had shut up, both were still mad, although at least now their anger was directed at the opposition and not each other. Joel quickly shuffled his make-shift quidditch pitch, sending forks, straws, and Merlin knows what else flying, to prevent the Gryffindors from looking at his game plan, although Draco highly doubted that they even knew Joel meant the spoons and salt shakers to be quidditch players, let alone in any set pattern. Clarissa looked like she was trying to decide whether or not to thank Hermione and Graham was clearly debating whether or not he should spill the syrup again just to spite know-it-all Hermione Granger. Blaise, Draco saw, had become cat-like, her usual demeanor was gone and her hair was practically standing on end and she was waiting to hiss at Hermione, may she make one false move.

Several from the other houses that were already awake were staring. Draco recognized several of the Hufflepuffs, a bratty curly haired kid, Justin Finch-Fletchley, the hyper second year Blaise pointed out a few weeks earlier as Rose Zeller, annoying Zacharias Smith and Quidditch captain himself, Eric Cadwallader, no longer eating breakfast with his younger sister Erin, but watching the brewing fight. Lisa Turpin and the a favorite gossip topic of Clarissa's and Christinia's, Mandy Brocklehurst, and Michael Corner, along with the most interesting and puzzling Ravenclaw of them all, Luna Lovegood, who Draco noticed seemed to be without the Lion hat she adorned to the pervious years games. Several more Gryffindors were headed towards them, Weasley and Potter, surely coming to aid their brainaic friend with stupid comebacks and Seamus Finnigan, whom Draco knew was still quite pissed off at Blaise for messing up his elbow, although he hadn't been her intended target and Seamus had at least acknowledged that if nothing else. The Gryffindors stomping towards the Slytherin wasn't what truly caught his interest though. It was the Gryffindor that wasn't, a Ginny Weasley.

"We'll see who wins." Joel snapped.

"Well, the only way we are going to see who wins is if we have a mirror." Kate hissed.

Blaise gave Jesse a look, both of them with eyebrows raised.

"You know because we'll win and we can't look at ourselves?" she explained.

Jesse snorted. "Yeah, we understood it. It was just stupid."

This time in was Blaise who snorted and then tried to cover her laughing up in turn nearly choking. Jamie smacked her hard on the back.

Katie snarled and huffed away, Hermione on her tail. Dean stayed a second longer, just long enough to glare at Draco as he had done ever since Ginny and Draco had been caught talking in the hall.

"Okay, we _have_ to win, if nothing else than to make that comment seem more pathetic than it was." Jesse laughed.

"The syrup is gone though," Clarissa said, examing the ends of her loose curly blonde hair.

"Do you ever think before you open your mouth?" Jamie asked, resulting in laughter from everyone except Joel and Clarissa, although Graham promptly stopped as soon as Joel glared at him.

* * *

_We Slytherins are the best_

_We will beat all the rest_

_Oh yes we will_

_The Gryffindors will lose_

_They will cry boo hoo_

_Oh yes they will_

_We will win the game_

_They'll be put to shame_

_Oh yes they will_

"Jamie, that is a horrible song." Graham muttered, fastening his emerald green quidditch robes.

"Yeah, even worse than that song Bletchley made us sing last year. Merlin, I hate Weasley is our King." Clarissa grumbled, searching for her green hair ribbon, for some reason unbeknownst to Draco, on the boys side of the team room.

"It gets stuck in your head and is there forever!" Jesse complained, handing Clarissa her ribbon. Draco didn't want to ask why he had it.

"Here, let me help you," Blaise said, appearing from the girls side in her matching robes, offering to tie back Clarissa's hair in the same fashion Blaise's was.

"I like having another girl on the team." Clarissa beamed as Blaise tied her hair.

"So do I." Jesse muttered. Blaise looked at him. "What? I hated having to tie Clarissa's ribbons for her!"

"Do I even want to know how you know how to a girl's hair back?" Joel asked, looking back and forth from his clipboard to Jesse.

"Probably not." Jamie laughed and Jesse scowled. At least , they were sort of getting along now.

Joel muttered something to himself and moved several of the pieces on his clipboard. Jamie took the moment of silence to begin singing again "We Slytherins are the best-"

"Shut it!" Jesse growled, clamping a hand over Jamie's mouth. "Now that song is stuck in my head! Dammit!"

"Slytherins are the best?"

"No! Weasley is Our King! AHH! I hate that song!" Jesse yelled.

"Welcome to first Quidditch match of the year, Gryffindor versus Slytherin. Today's commentator is Ravenclaw Luna Lovegood." Professor McGonagall shouted in the mega phone. "Would the quidditch teams please make their way onto the field."

The captain led the way for the team, the rest followed in pairs. Joel walked out on the field, following closely by Clarissa and Graham, then Jesse and Blaise, and Jamie and Draco.

"Quidditch Captains Potter and Pritchard, ha they both start with Ps, make your way to the center." Luna said, laughing at the names. McGonagall shook her head and Draco wondered what in the world potion Luna must have slipped McGonagall to let her commentate, because anyone who had ever spent more than five minutes with Luna should have known not to allow her to commentate.

"I want a fair game." Madame Hooch hissed, eyeing Blaise and then Ron. Neither Joel nor Harry gave any evidence that they heard her.

"The Quaffle is tossed..." Luna said, for once not in a dreamy state. McGonagall looked relieved. "And Graham Prichard takes off towards Keeper Ronald Weasley. You know I met Ronald Weasley on the train. He tells very funny jokes. Ask him to tell you one, you'll laugh." she assured the crowd. McGonagall smacked her hand to her forehead and just sank into the chair next to Luna, knowing that there was nothing she could do now.

"Pritchard lost the Quaffle, now Ginny Weasley has it, now Pritchard does, but the other Prichard not the first Prichard, both Pritchards really shouldn't be chasers. Well, now the other Pritchard has it, not the other Pritchard, the first Prichard, no now its the other Pritchard, the other Pritchard being the second Pritchard although I guess he really is the first born so maybe he should be the first Pritcha-"

"She's giving me a headache!" Jesse screamed to Draco, as they were flying near each other.

"-rd. I'll just call them by their first names. Joey Pritchard passes it to Clarissa Hawthorne. She's very pretty, I think. Don't you think Professor?" Luna asked McGonagall.

"It's Joel Pritchard, not Joey!" Draco heard Corrine scream from where she was cheering in the stands close to where he was flying. Christina Woodbury and Kate Judd were right next to her, all three wearing green rosettes pinned to their cloaks. Draco noticed Corrine seemed practicularly eager to cheer on Joel and not Jesse or Jamie.

"And Blaise Zucchini whacks a bludger right at chaser Katie Bell."

"Zucchini?" Jesse and Draco said to each other in unison.

"I don't really know this Blaise character but Draco Malfoy likes her and Draco Malfoy is cool." Luna said, nodding. "Hi Draco!"

Draco could feel his cheeks burning in the crisp cool autumn air as the Slytherins snickered.

"Would you stick to Quidditch?" McGonagall pleaded with Luna.

"No, I'm not a very good player." Luna said, misinterpreting McGonagall's comments, causing a roar of laughter from the stands.

"Okay, Hawthorne has the Quaffle, Finna-something took it, passed it to Ginny, hi Ginny! Ginny shoots, Jamie Hart dives, ouch! And he's hit his head on the goal post thanks to that bludger from Dean Thomas, Ginny's boyfriend. He's got a bit of temper that one."

"Ginny scores!" Luna screamed, doing a little dance that wasn't particularly graceful, Draco almost thought she was having a seizure in the commentator's booth until McGonagall asked her to stop dancing.

"Hey Hart!" Jesse bellowed, flying closer to him. "You all right?"

"My head hurts!" Jamie said, clutching his head with one hand and using the other to stay on the broom.

"Kind of a ringing sensation?" Jesse asked.

Jamie nodded and then had a look on his face like he seriously regretted that.

"CUT THE CHIT CHAT!" Joel yelled as he flew by taking the quaffle from Ginny.

Jesse sent a bludger that was clearly headed towards Draco flying but was unable to save the one that Dean had sent at Jamie. Katie had blocked Blaise from getting to it.

"Oww!" Luna and the Slytherins cringed. Jamie took the bludger in the left side, now Jamie was fit but he certainly wasn't big enough to take a bludger at close range and not move. He fell backwards through the middle hoop, his broom, falling with him.

"JAMIE!" Blaise screamed from where Katie still had her blocked, preventing her from flying towards him.

Jamie fell fast, Jesse and Draco were both on his tail, but neither were fast enough. Jamie came crashing down into the sandy pit below the goals, not moving from where he landed.

"LEAVE HIM!" Joel bellowed to Jesse and Draco. They both hesitated but flew away when they saw Theodore Nott and Eric Cadwallader coming foward to carry him off the field and to the hospital wing.

"This means war." Jesse commented and Draco nodded. The Gryffindors started this game and it would be up to the Slytherins to finish it.

"Gryffindor leads seventy to ten." Luna said, minutes later. "The lack of keeper has definitely helped the Gryffindors. I hope Jamie is okay. He reads the Quibbler you know..."

Draco highly doubted that Jamie read the Quibbler but he was in Luna's year so maybe Luna did know more about him than Draco did.

"And Finnigan is down!" Luna screamed into the mega phone. McGonagall next to her stood up to see. Draco hadn't even seen Jesse hit that bludger but sure enough Seamus was lying on the grass below, this time Cormac McLaggen and Neville Longbottom came out to take him off the field. Draco was sure it was McLaggen that would be helping him off, Neville certainly didn't look like he had any respectable amount of strength...

"And Thomas retaliates with a bludger at beater Zucchini! That one had to hurt." Luna said, wincing. "Hope that wasn't her quill hand." Draco looked, it was her quill hand.

Only a few more minutes passed but it felt like hours to the two teams. This match had become an all out war, nearly every player on the field, and the three in the hosptial wing, Joel joined them after Peakes accidentally slammed into him causing him to fall off his broom, had injuries. Draco personally took a bludger to the shoulder, in addition to Blaise's earlier hand injury, she also lost a bit of her broom when Katie clipped her, Ron had a gashing wound on his knee, blood on his robes, Peakes had a black eye, Potter took a bludger to the elbow, Katie hit a hoop when Clarissa cut her off, Clarissa had a huge bruise on her cheekbone from Dean's beater bat, Dean and Jesse were unscathed, Ginny's hand was hit by a pinballed bludger between Peakes and Blaise, and Graham kept doubling over in pain from a bludger in the stomach, but refused to quit.

"At rate this game keeps up we could have a few casualities by lunch time." Luna said, much to the dismay of McGonagall. "I have my galleons on Graham being the next to drop."

"MISS LOVEGOOD!"

"Well, putting my money on Thomas or Green would just be silly. They're not hurt yet." Luna reasoned. "But give them time."

"We will be discussing this after the game," McGonagall hissed probably not intending on the entire pitch hearing it through the megaphone.

"Oh, I was wrong!" Luna winced. "Peakes is down!"

Peakes, swinging and missing the bludger, took it square in the shoulder and fell backwards right into the arms of Katie Bell, who upon realizing that he was out cold, lowered her broom to the ground where Jack Sloper and Professor Sprout rushed over.

"Let's play fair!" McGonagall shouted into Luna's megaphone. Luna didn't seem to notice.

"Right now the Slytherins are down by one hundred and sixty points and a keeper and a chaser. The Gryffindors are down a beater and a chaser." Luna said. "I have received word that Seamus Finnigan is all right and awake."

Three quarters of the audience cheered.

"However, he will not be rejoining the game as Madam Pomfrey wants his knee to heal." One quarter of the audience cheered. "Thank you, Jack Sloper for this news brief."

"Hawthorne has the quaffle, she flies past Ginny, ducks around a bludger sent by Thomas, Zucchini hits the bludger back towards Thomas, HAWTHORNE SCORES!"

If Draco found the snitch now, they would tie. He was going to wait. They had to win this one.

"Ginny has the quaffle, bludger nailed by Zucchini, quaffle passed to Bell, oh intercepted by Pritchard, Graham that is-"

"It's Blaise ZABINI!" McGonagall snapped.

"Okay Graham has the quaffle, my, he can sure fly fast, him and Clarissa Hawthorne work well as a team, oh Hawthorne is stopped by a body slam from Thomas. Merlin, is he out for blood this game. Graham regains possession of the quaffle, no Ginny has it, ducks a bludger from Green and Graham tries to act as surrogate keeper but is too slow due to his injury, Ginny scores!"

Draco noticed a gold glitter right above his head. If he caught it now, Slytherin would lose. However it would put the team out of their misery. Graham was still clutching his stomach, it was obviously killing him. Clarissa's bruise appeared to be growing, his own shoulder was killing him, Blaise was no longer gripping her broom properly. Jesse was the only one still unscathed and Draco knew that Jesse would rather play on his own than give up to the Gryffindors.

Draco took off towards the opposite side of the pitch in hopes of Potter following him. Luckily, he did and Potter went into a dive with him.

"NO! FOUL FOUL FOUL!" Luna was screaming into the megaphone. Both Draco and Potter looked up they could nearly touch the grass and were forced to come to a stop, an emerald-robed player was falling fast, but still way above them, they, or at least Draco, couldn't tell who it was. It wasn't Jesse, however, who was diving towards the falling body.

Draco started racing towards the fallen player. Was it Blaise? Was it Jamie? Clarissa? Joel? Graham? He frantically asked himself, forgetting that two were already in the hospital wing. A red haired Gryffindor was flying towards them too, Draco hadn't noticed the Gryffindor until then. Was it Ron? Was it Ginny? Why couldn't he get an answer to his questions?

"Clarissa!" Jesse screamed. Draco saw the look on Jesse's face. It was pure panic.

NO! Draco thought wishing he could speed the broom up. He, Jesse, and the Gryffindor he now knew to be Ginny were moving so slow and Clarissa was falling so fast, he thought his head was going to explode.

She was getting closer, Ginny was getting closer, Jesse was getting closer, he was getting closer.

And then there was a scream, a thud, another scream, a yelp, a sob, and a crash into the ground.

"What happened?" McGonagall yelled, standing up to see out of the box.

"Beater Jesse Green has caught Chaser Clarissa Hawthorne. Clarissa still is not moving. Seeker Draco Malfoy and Chaser Ginny Weasley seem to have collided and are now on the ground in a tangle. Are they okay? I like Draco and Ginny!" Luna wailed, stomping her foot.

"Blaise?" Draco muttered, not sure quite what was going on but definitely knew that there was grass pressing against his cheek and a broom handle poking him in the side.

"No," the body next to him muttered. "I'm Ginny."

"Ginny!" Potter yelled, Draco could see him sprint towards them. Harry picked Ginny off the ground as if she weighed nothing.

"OUCH!" She hollered, whipping her arm away from him.

Jesse landed on the ground, Clarissa in his arms, Madam Hooch runnings towards the five on the ground.

Colin Creevey and Ernie McMillian came rushing over, Madam Hooch magicked up a strecher.

"Madam Hooch has called a time-out due to the number of injuries!" Luna called. "Clarissa's strecher is being accompanied by Hufflepuff Ernie McSomethingorOther to the hospital wing. The univolved players, Graham, Dean, Blaise, and Ron are coming towards the scene. Harry is uninjured from this particular foul as is attacker Katie. Madam Hooch is examining Ginny Weasley's wound on her face and her hand that was injured earlier. Wait, Madam Hooch is saying something...Ginny is out of the game! Unbelievable! Sloper, what is she saying?" Luna called to Jack on the ground via some sort of communication device. "Ginny is being accompanied to the hospital wing by housemate Colin Creevey due to extensive injuries to her head and hand!"

"Are you all right?" Blaise and Madam Hooch asked Draco at the same time.

"Yeah." He moaned, struggling to get to his feet. Jesse offered him a hand but he declined.

"You!" Madam Hooch snapped, finger pointed at Katie Bell. "Get off the field!"

"What?" Katie snapped. "It was an accident!"

"You had no reason to ram into her! She didn't have the quaffle!" Graham screamed, Draco noticed he was still holding his stomach when he thought no one was looking.

"She wasn't holding a quaffle and you hit her with a force that was uncalled for if you just meant to block her. It is a foul! Now, off the field!" Madam Hooch said.

"And Chaser Katie Bell is off the team. Two Gryffindors and one Slytherin taken out with one quick foul! At this rate, few will make it out alive!" Luna called into the megaphone. "Take your pick on who will be the last one standing!"

"This is not funny!" McGonagall hissed.

"Who do you think will be the last one standing, Professor?" Luna asked, it appearing to Draco that Luna had no idea that she had crossed the line. "I'm guessing Jesse."

"Resume play and I mean it when I say play fair!"

"Play is resumed with four Slytherins and three Gryffindors, however Graham Pritchard of Slytherin is not looking good. Do you need a healer, Graham?" Luna asked. "And Graham has indicated that he does not need healer but the look on his face tells us otherwise."

"GO GRYFFINDOR!" A roar from the Hufflepuff and Gryffindor sections. A few Ravenclaws cheered too, but it almost seemed to Draco that perhaps a few were noticing that maybe the Gryffindors were playing a tad bit rough.

"Pritchard, the only remaining chaser in the entire game, has the quaffle, he swerves past Thomas, past Harry, and it's IN! Slytherin scores! Right now it's a 450 to 310, Gryffindor. If either Draco or Harry caught the snitch at this point their team would be secured the win."

"Watch out! Whoa! Zucchini, I'm sorry Professor, _Zabini_ nearly avoids being nailed with a bludger but she manages to clip it with her bat and send it towards Keeper Ronald Weasley, who avoids it with a nice roll on the broom. Excellent, Ronald!" Luna called, waving to the Gryffindor seeker."Okay, remaining beater Dean Thomas sends it back, ooh, it barely misses the blonde head of Draco Malfoy, who cannot seem to find that snitch!"

This was getting ridiculous. Draco was tired and prayed that this game would end soon. It was now rounding on dinnertime, the sky was darkening, rain clouds overhead, and some of the crowd had already left out of boredom and coldness. Now, Draco thought this was probably one of the more interesting games Hogwarts had probably ever witnessed but it had lasted several long hours already and surely the crowd was getting restless.

"I hurt," Graham winced, looking like he was having issues breathing as he flew past Draco after scoring another goal. "I can't take this."

"Come on, a little longer," Jesse said, tapping a bludger away from them. "Just get the snitch Draco."

Like Draco hadn't been planning on doing that all along.

"Ronald Weasley scores! Clearly, beater Blaise Zabini was not meant to be a surrogate keeper." Luna said. "Now will someone please catch the snitch?"

"I'll cover goal." Draco heard Jesse call to Blaise she nodded and then motioned towards the sky. Draco looked up. It was going to rain. Soon.

"Looks like the Slytherin beaters have noticed the weather. It does look like it might rain..." Luna said. "Did you know Professor, that the Crumple Horned Snorkack is a fan of the wet weather?"

"Miss Lovegood would you please pay attention? Slytherin just scored!" Professor McGonagall roared motioning to Graham who had managed to throw the Quaffle past Weasley.

"Oh, beater Jesse Green just took a bludger to the shoulder! Zabini hurries over to prevent it from hitting him again, but Dean Thomas has other plans, Draco is flying towards something, Harry hasn't moved yet, Dean whacks the bludger at Zabini, Zabini has two bludgers flying after her, ouch! Zabini manages to hit one, in turn hitting Ronald Weasley, who has now dropped the quaffle, but the second bludger ricochets off of Blaise's broom, Blaise is now hanging under the broom by both hands, the left one was injured earlier by a bludger from Dean Thomas, she has already let go of the broomstick with her left hand, it appears swollen, what is this, Slytherin chaser Graham has helped her back up, beater Thomas and captain Harry Potter are furious, both are screaming about something after Thomas nearly collided with Harry, Graham is flying towards the ground, I believe he is giving up, Green appears to be nursing a shoulder wound, Potter has just noticed that Malfoy is streaming towards something, Dean swings a bludger at Draco, Blaise intercepts the bludger with the tail end of her broom, I think that broom is out of comission, yes, Jack Sloper has indicated that Zabini is rapidly descending, Green has taken off towards Thomas, Potter, and Malfoy, Potter is gaining, but not quick enough, does he have it, no, he lost it, Potter has apparently too. Pritchard's wounds are so immobolizing that Sprout appears to be trying to treat him right on the edge of the field. Slytherin is now down to three players and two brooms, all three players considerably injured. Gryffindor has three players. Jesse Green sends a bludger flying towards Potter, Potter feints and dodges the bludger, what's this? Green appears to be picking Zabini up from the middle of the pitch where her Nimbus 2001 died. Both beaters are on one broom, Zabini has wrapped her injured left arm around Green's waist and has her beater's bat in her nondominant hand. Will this work for them or will this tactic bring down the players?"

Draco frantically looked around for the damn snitch. Where the hell was it? This game needed to end! Three players were already in the hospital wing, one was moaning in pain on the field, one broom died in the game, two shoulders were dramatically injured and were still playing, and one left hand now appeared to be quite bruised and battered. Would it end already?

That's when he saw it. Potter took off at the exact same time, it was right above Dean Thomas's ear. Potter tried to motion for Dean to move but he didn't understand. Both Draco and Harry were headed straight for Dean, why in Merlin's name was he not moving? Deer in headlights or something. They were gaining if they didn't move they would surely collide, move Dean dammit, Draco thought, barely centimeters between him and Harry, both pressing for the spot were the snitch was, the spot were Dean was hovering, if he caught this they would win by fifty points, if he could just move a little faster...Dean still didn't move, last chance for Draco to move, no he was going to take the hit and win the game-

"Harry swerves to avoid Dean Thomas who was preoccupied with a bludger but Slytherin seeker Malfoy plows ahead, taking out the Gryffindor beater, and wait, yes, yes it appears that Draco Malfoy has caught the snitch, SLYTHERIN WINS BY A MERE FIFTY POINTS!" Luna yelled, jumping up and down in her quidditch booth.

"Official scores just in. Slytherin wins with a score of 530 to 480. Slytherin finishes with three players on the field, beaters Jesse Green and Blaise Zabini and seeker Draco Malfoy. Gryffindor finishes with three players on the field, beater Dean Thomas, keeper Ronald Weasley, and seeker Harry Potter. Thank you for listening and I am Luna Lovegood."

"_Finally_," McGonagall audibly muttered near the megaphone.

"How'd I do Professor?" Luna asked. Draco had to laugh that Luna was clueless enough to even bother asking McGonagall a question that the whole school already knew the answer to.

The Slytherins in the crowd were screaming in delight. This was the sweetest victory they had possibly ever had.

"DRACO!" Blaise screamed in happiness at him as Jesse and Blaise neared the ground in the pitch where he was standing still holding the snitch. "YOU GOT IT!"

"We won!" Draco said, it still seemed quite unbelievable. There wasn't even enough players in total left on the field to fill one team. Draco smirked when he saw Dean Thomas land and slam his beater's bat into the ground, it bouncing back so hard that it nearly hit Weasley.

"It's raining," Jesse said, Blaise's arm still around his waist. Draco felt oddly annoyed at this but quickly dropped this thought when Jesse caught him off guard and threw his arm around Draco's neck for one big group hug. They fell backwards onto the pitch ground, where it was rapidly becoming quite muddy.

"That was the dumbest thing we've ever done," Blaise laughed in pain at the fact they chose to fall backwards in excitement since all three had injuries that were only upset by the fall.

"I know." Jesse laughed. "And it hurts and for some reason I find it hilarious."

"We are bloody morons." Draco added though he himself was laughing. He was only vaguely aware of the Slytherin rosette some tossed towards them that landed near Blaise's elbow.

"Bloody morons who won!" all three shouted in unison and then the laughter ensued.

"WE WON!" Jamie shouted, obviously he had just come running from the castle.

"Watch it!" Blaise laughed as Jamie threw himself into the group pile.

"You okay, dude?" Jesse asked, rubbing his own shoulder.

"I woke up about two hours ago. I've been listening to commentary in the hospital wing but when we won I ran down here. Look at my bruise!" Jamie said, proudly lifting up his shirt to reveal a massive purple bruise on the left side of his abdomen. "Pomfrey gave me some paste to put on it."

"Anyone who is hurt make your way to the hospital wing!" Madam Hooch shouted at the four muddy and soaking wet Slytherins, all of whom she knew were injured.

The four Slytherins marched happily towards the hospital wing. Draco and Jesse were reliving each moment that either one outsmarted a Gryffindor while Jamie and Blaise were still examining Jamie's bruise and were having a serious debate as to what it looked like, Draco thought it looked like a bludger mark, which was what had hit Jamie but he wasn't going to bring it up and rain on their debate.

"THERE ARE TOO MANY PEOPLE IN HERE!" Madam Pomfrey shouted. "If you aren't injured, get out!"

Lavender Brown, Katie Bell, Colin Creevey, Dennis Creevey and Parvati Patil scampered out. Corrine Colt, Christina Woodbury, Kate Judd, and Pansy Parkinson left but weren't as eager to follow Madam Pomfrey's orders. Hermione Granger stayed put, ignoring her. Draco hoped Pomfrey would noticed and give her a detention at least. The mudblood deserved that.

Pomfrey ushered everyone into a bed, even those who didn't need one. "But honestly, it's just my shoulder, I can stand-"

"Sit down!" Pomfrey said, forcing Draco to sit on a bed between Graham and Peakes, who were talking over him.

"Broke two ribs." Graham said motioning to the bandage around his chest.

"Dislocated shoulder. Took a bludger to it." Peakes said. "Missed it when I tried to bat it away."

"I think you had the one honest injury in the whole game." Draco commented and both Peakes and Graham nodded.

"I think so." Peakes said. "That was a hell of a vicious game." Draco noticed that his black eye looked worse than earlier.

"Peakes!" Dean Thomas shouted.

"Are you injured?" Pomfrey asked, glaring at Dean. He shook his head. "THEN OUT! YOU TOO!" She said, ushering both Dean and Hermione out the door.

"How did you get muddy?" Pomfrey asked just noticing the state of Jamie's robes. "DID YOU LEAVE THIS HOSPITAL WING?"

"No," Jamie whispered in a clearly guilty tone.

"YOU HIT YOUR HEAD! YOU HAVE TO STAY HERE!" she bellowed.

"Ugh," Clarissa moaned, holding her ears. Madam Pomfrey, clearly woke her up.

"Oh, dear, let me put this on your face." She said, smoothing the same paste she had given Jamie on Clarissa's bruise which to Draco thought looked sort of like a Chocolate Frog card. Clarissa wouldn't be happy to hear that. Not that she'd be happy to hear that her bruise was in any other shape.

Nearly four hours later, the Slytherin players were deemed fit to be released from the hospital wing.

"You know," Jamie said, "we look like a walking advertisement for a medical supplies company."

Clarissa laughed and then put a hand on her jaw, apparently laughing hurt her.

"We play Ravenclaws next." Joel muttered, walking with his arm around Clarissa.

"Ahh, we can take 'em" Jamie crowed, waving his hand as if they were nothing. "After this I betting we could take on England. Or at least Scotland."

"Okay, I want to figure this out, who took out who?" Joel asked, Draco was sure that was mentally making a million quidditch notes for future games, even though Joel Pritchard would never ever play against this particular quidditch team again.

"Thomas hit the bludger at Jamie that knocked him to the ground." Jesse said. "And Peakes crashed into you, so you fell, but I'm not entirely sure that he meant to hit you. He doesn't seem as malicious as Thomas."

"Dean Thomas does seem to have a vendetta against us." Clarissa noted. "More so than the others."

"Draco and I had a bit of a run-in with Dean a couple of weeks ago. We were talking with Ginny and he really didn't like that. In fact, he was yelling at her about it." Blaise confessed, moving away from Joel and closer to Draco as she said it.

"Oh, really?" Joel said, eyeing both of them as if it was specifically their fault for the brutal Gryffindor players.

"We were getting along with Weasley." Draco snapped, shielding Blaise a bit from Joel. "Dean flew off the handle for no reason. Ginny even told him that. He just doesn't like Slytherins."

"I don't like Gryffindors." Graham replied, folding his arms over his chest. "My stomach still hurts from the bludger Dean hit me with."

"What's the password?" Blaise asked as they rounded the corridor to the entrance to the common room.

"Nimbus 2001." Draco answered and they filed into the opening, with once again Joel leading the way for his team.

"CONGRATULATIONS!" the common room roared when all seven players were in the entrance.

Draco took a second to look around the room. Madrigal Evans, the cynical yet realistic first year, and her classmate, Nora Willows, a small, quiet girl with hair the color of chocolate milk, were holding up a huge banner that read Go Slytherin! Christina and Kate were both still wearing their rosettes, Corrine's however was suspiciously missing, Draco assumed she was the one that had thrown it at him, Jesse, and Blaise.

"Oh, way to go, Draco!" Pansy giggled and came up to him and planted a kiss on his cheek before he even realized what she was doing. He pushed her away in disgust and caught Blaise choking with laughter on a drink that someone had handed her as they walked in.

Draco wiped his cheek with the sleeve of his robes, making a mental note to have a ceremonial burning of these robes as soon as possible.

"You're here for only two minutes tops and she already got ya," Blaise laughed and then downed a little more of her drink. "Want some?" she asked, holding the cup up to his face.

"Um, no thanks." He said and Blaise shrugged. "What are you drinking?"

"I dunno." She answered, absentmindedly rubbing the hand she hurt earlier. "Theodore gave it to me."

Theodore, a lanky boy with an annoying knowledge of useless information, was standing in the corner laughing about something with Joel, Aidan Conner, and Brian Colt, all were holding cups identical to Blaise's.

"It's kind of like a spunky butterbeer." She decided before taking another sip. "I sure like it though."

"Draco!" Jamie called from his spot on the sofa. "Come 'ere!"

"What's up?" He asked, plopping on the sofa between Clarissa and Jamie. Jamie was eagerly chatting with Corrine who was sipping her drink and watching Jamie intently.

"Was Katie the Gryffindor that accused Blaise at the try-outs ?" He asked, Corrine nodding behind him.

"Yeah."

"I told you; I was there." Corrine hissed, but not in an upset way. "Popcorn?"

Draco looked at it. It was caramel. He liked caramel. "Thanks."

"Well, Clarissa wouldn't let us near the accident. You were the only non-team member over there." Jamie replied, taking a handful of the caramel popcorn.

"Blaise wasn't a team member at the time either." Corrine countered, Draco wondered how resentful she was that Blaise made the team instead of her.

"What about me?" Blaise asked, wandering over with Theodore and Joel. Blaise sat herself between Jamie and Draco, while Joel scooted Clarissa down to sit next to her at the end of the sofa. Theodore just sat on the coffee table next to Corrine.

"Nothing." Corrine answered, looking away from Blaise and to Jesse and Jamie, both sitting next to each other and fighting for her attention. Draco was sure that by now Corrine knew that she had both of them wrapped around her finger. She however, clearly was not interested.

"That's a lie." Blaise said. "I am tired."

"Me too." Jesse, Joel, Draco, and Clarissa answered at the same time. Everyone laughed, Pansy's sounded like a dog was being strangled.

"Not me!" Jamie shouted. "I'm ready for round two! Come on, bring it!"

The laughter continued, all though this time it included some shaking of heads in disbelief at Jamie.

And the party continued well into the early hours of Sunday. Draco had enjoyed it overall, Jamie gave several re-enactments of his fall by climbing onto the fireplace and catapaulting himself onto one of the plush emerald green sofas, Draco suspected that he had had several of the drinks he believed to be a mixture of firewhiskey and butterbeer before attempting this feat. They played music loudly and proudly, even causing Professor Snape to come and ask them to settle down especially after Jesse and Jamie's duet of Slytherins are the Best, althought promptly after the riveting duet they got in a fight and preceeded to fight about the pettiest things the rest of the party. Some of the Slytherins started dancing to the music, Joel and Clarissa were probably the best and Draco absolutely loved when Goyle stepped on Pansy's foot and they both fell to the floor, Pansy hollering in pain. There was another scuffle later when Corrine tried to cut in on Joel and Clarissa and Clarissa refused while Joel accepted, both Joel and Corrine walked away from that conversation with a smack from Clarissa.

"Tired..."Blaise muttered, resting her head on Draco's shoulder. She certainly wasn't the only one. On her left side on the couch, Jesse was already fast asleep, and on Draco's right, Graham had passed out hours ago. It was nearly six in the morning. Draco was pretty sure he too might have drifted off earlier, too tired to make his way up to the dorm, but he couldn't remember. Only a few Slytherins remained awake, Joel and Theodore were playing some card game over by the popcorn, most of the Slytherins had gone to bed, a few were asleep like the team in the common room. Corrine was curled up on an arm chair near the fire place, and a second year whose name he couldn't remember had fallen asleep on the window seat, his head leaning against the wall, like Draco that time he and Blaise stayed up talking.

"The party can't end yet..." Jamie said, his voice trailing off as he was clearly tired from all his jumping around and singing numbers.

"Not yet..." Blaise replied, but didn't finish her thought as her eyelids were too heavy to keep open. Draco allowed his own to close, ending his perfectly happy day with a wonderfully happy moment.

* * *

Author's Note: Hi ya! Thanks so much for reading this chapter, I hoped you liked it. Writing quidditch commentary is really difficult, I'm not a big sports fan, I've only ever played soccer which has no commentary, so I've never really listened to commentary but I figured Luna was commenting (I originally was going to have Corrine commentate, but after reading Half Blood Prince, I decided that Luna was a much more fun character, turns out she's really hard to write for) so it was okay if it was a little weird. I also didn't realize it until my friend that read this over for me pointed it out (Hi Lauren!) that I had a lot of people with the same letter names (Jamie, Joel, Jesse and then Corrine, Clarissa, Christina) but all of these characters were mentioned in earlier chapters so none of their names could be changed, I hadn't realized that when I was writing this, sorry.

Thanks again for reading and please, please review!

Special Thanks to:

Kiwi: Thank you so much for your sweet review!

Saotoshi & Anni: Thank you guys so much for reviewing. You guys are awesome!

Please, please review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink

Preppy in Pink


	6. Have You Ever

Disclaimer: Joel Pritchard, Clarissa Hawthorne, Jamie Hart, Corrine Colt, Jesse Green, Jolie Taylor,Kristen Hart,Paul, Matt, Ethan, Jon, and Parker are mine.

Author's Note: You are going to be so proud, I actually am starting this chapter only minutes after posting the last one. I know, a part of hell really is going to freeze over!

_Sometimes it's wrong to walk away, though you think it's over  
Knowing there's so much more to say  
Suddenly the moment's gone  
And all your dreams are upside down  
And you just wanna change the way the world goes round _

Tell me, have you ever loved and lost somebody  
Wished there was a chance to say I'm sorry  
Can't you see, that's the way I feel about you and me, Baby  
Have you ever felt your heart was breaking  
Lookin down the road you should be taking  
I should know, cos I loved and lost the day I let you go

Can't help but think that this is wrong, we should be together  
Back in your arms where I belong  
Now I've finally realised it was forever that I've found  
I'd give it all to change the way the world goes round

_I really wanna hear you say that you know just how it feels  
To have it all and let it slip away, can't you see  
Even though the moment's gone, I'm still holding on somehow  
Wishing I could change the way the world goes round _

Tell me, have you ever loved and lost somebody  
Wished there was a chance to say I'm sorry (I'm sorry)  
Can't you see, (ohhh) that's the way I feel about you and me, Baby  
Have you ever felt your heart was breaking  
Lookin down the road you should be taking  
I should know, (I should know) cos I loved and lost the day I let  
Yes I loved and lost the day I let  
Yes I loved and lost the day I let you go

_Have You Ever by S Club 7_

_

* * *

_

**Chapter Six**

"Sit down and listen." Madam Hooch snapped. Joel took his seat back on the bench.

"That game yesterday was disgraceful. Never in the history of this school have I seen such malicious and vindictive playing. You are very lucky that none of you are permanently injured because it was just sheer dumb luck that some of those injuries, particularly the ones where players were thrown off their brooms, were not deadly. I should suspend all of you." Draco was shocked. They couldn't lose quidditch. Quidditch was one of the only things in this school that he actually liked.

Joel and Harry, the quidditch captains, jumped to their feet. "No!"

"I said I should, now sit down." Madam Hooch said. "But quite frankly, I think a quidditch tournament with only two teams is rather pathetic. So I will allow both teams to continue playing, but you better be on your best behavior out there. One suspicious foul, and the whole team is suspended. Got it?"

She received tweleve "Yes"s and two nods of the head. Ginny Weasley and Blaise had chosen to remain silent. Draco wondered why.

"Good." Madam Hooch said.

"Can we leave?" Dean asked, quite irked.

"One more thing." Madam Hooch said, pausing for dramatic effect and speaking in a whisper. "That was some of best damn quidditch playing I've ever seen." And with a smile and a twinkle in her eye, she walked away, leaving the fourteen of them to sit there and wonder if she really said what they thought she said.

"Did she say...?" Jamie asked, looking very puzzled, an expression that Draco noted was on several of the other's faces.

"I think so..." Seamus Finnigan answered.

"Well, that was not what I was expecting." Ginny replied, finally speaking up.

"What were you expecting, Miss Weasley?" Dumbledore said, appearing in the doorway that Madam Hooch had just left from. None of the fourteen saw him arrive.

"Um, I'm not sure exactly." Ginny confessed, a little startled by Dumbledore's sudden appearance.

"What's going on Professor?" Harry asked although a piece of Draco wondered if Harry already knew, he and the headmaster were close. Everyone could see Harry was his favorite student.

"I wanted to have a chat with you all about yesterday's quidditch game. I must say I was not particularly pleased with what I witnessed." Dumbledore had said that he wanted to chat but every student there, even Clarissa who Draco always thought was a tad slow, seemed to understand that when he said chat, he meant "I want to talk and I want you to listen."

"I have feared this for many a years now and it is now time to take action against before we are left in a trurly irreversible situation." Dumbledore continued, pausing for a moment. No one was following his train of thought. Draco was sure that couldn't have possibly meant that he had been fearing Katie Bell knocking Clarissa off her broom for years.

"The separate houses have their advantages and disadvantages. The houses allow for students of similar ways to be together however they also separate from others of different ways and beliefs and promote competition, a competition which I now see has taken a seriously unhealthy turn. I would like to correct this before it becomes detrimental to the welfare and the future of the school."

Draco was starting to see where this was headed, but he certainly didn't understand how the headmaster planned to weaken the rivalry between the houses, these rivalries were centuries old and generations deep. Nothing was going to change that.

"The Halloween feast is nearing, a mere two weeks away, and I hope that I have given enough time to allow my plan to work. This year the feast and dance will celebrate Halloween and our unity as a school, not four separate houses. I plan to make my announcement at dinner but I feel that since you fourteen felt the need to spark my plans, you could do with hearing of them first. Everyone may attend the celebration on one condition, they must come with a member of a different house. You will come with the fellow Hogwarts student, enjoy the feast with the student, and stay with the other house student the entire celebration. No exceptions." Dumbledore said.

Draco turned to look at his housemates. Joel and Clarissa looked irked, Draco was sure that they had planned on going together, Jamie and Jesse looked both relieved and shocked, at least the drama between them and Corrine would be nonexistant this dance. Then it struck Draco. He couldn't ask Blaise. This thought struck a scary note in his head. Why had he thought of taking her? He did not like her like that. Anyway, he could not go with her. She was a Slytherin. Like him. He caught her eye and she smiled. She actually liked the idea? She wanted to go with someone from another house? No!

"You mean we cannot go with someone from our own house?" Dean inquired, Draco noticed he was clutching tightly to Ginny's hand. Draco suddenly felt a pang of sympathy for her. Surely Dean would not allow her to go with someone else. Oh well, at least he knew now that one other person besides himself would not be there.

"Yes, Mister Thomas, that is exactly what I mean." Dumbledore answered. Draco wondered if he knew that Ginny was dating him.

"Now, I expect that you all had other ideas as to how you wanted to spend your Sunday then talkng with me, so I will leave you."

* * *

Dumbledore obviously knew that word of the Halloween dance would spread like wildfire even though he only told fourteen students. Draco was sure that within an hour everyone in the entire school knew about it, even the loners like Luna and Longbottom.

"Hello!" Blaise said, standing behind the sofa Draco was sitting at and talking right next to his left ear. It tickled and he scooted away. He had avoided Blaise most of the morning, since the meeting.

"Hello." Draco replied, talking to her was inevitable. More than ever, she seemed to always be right there. Did she not have any other friends? Why didn't he have any other friends?

"Want to go for a walk on the grounds?" She asked, leaning over so her head was next to his. "The trees are changing colors, it's beautiful."

He didn't want to go but he didn't want to be rude. And he liked spending time with Blaise. Blaise was suddenly one of his closest friends. He wasn't mad at her. He wasn't sure who he was mad at. He didn't understand why the dance thing was upseting him so much. He didn't like Blaise like that. She was a friend. It wasn't like Blaise liked him like that either. The way she teased Jesse, the way she walked with him to the meeting, the way she disapproved of his crush on Corrine, all signs pointed to Jesse. Stupid Jesse.

"Sure." Draco replied, getting up and Blaise smiled.

"You might want to get your cloak." She said. "It's a bit nippy."

"Oh, okay, thanks," Draco muttered and summoned his cloak from his dormitory.

"So who do you think you will go with to this dance?" Blaise asked the inevitable question when they reached a door to the outside. This was the reason, Draco suddenly reasoned, that he did not want to go with her.

"My, it is cold." Draco said, avoiding the question.

"Are you going?" She asked, kicking a pebble on the stone path, Draco watched it roll under a vivid yellow leaf. She was right it was pretty.

"I can't think of any one from another house who I'd like to go with." Draco admitted.

"Well, that's very snobby of you." Blaise retorted bluntly.

"Excuse me?" Draco said, unable to see what she meant by that statement.

"No one you'd like to go with?" She repeated. "You don't have to fancy the person. Just a friend."

"Well, I don't have friends outside of this house. As you may have noticed Slytherins are a bit isolated from the rest of the school." Draco snapped, defending his lack of non-Slytherin friends. "I don't see you with many non-Slytherin friends. In fact, you spend all your time with me and since I never spend time with anyone else, then I guess you don't either."

Blaise looked like he had just smacked her across the cheek. "Well, I'm sorry that I am apparently bothering you so much." She said, looking more hurt than when Hermione yelled at her.

"You know I didn't mean it that way." Draco said, trying to touch her hand. She pulled away sharply, almost causing her to stumble.

"_Do I_?" She snapped back, folding her arms across her chest. "You know, I could find a date to this thing." She hissed. "I was going to suggest staying back in the common room because quite frankly I couldn't go with the person I really want to go with, but I think I've changed my mind. You don't have to go Draco, I know how your lack of friends would make this a bit of a challenge for you, but I assure you I **will** be there."

And with that she whipped around and walked away. Draco was sure she would find a date. No guy would hesitate in asking her out. She was pretty, her long dark straight hair, her bright Slytherin green eyes. And lately, up until this very conversation, she was much happier and relaxed, clearly the pressure from her parents to do the Death Eaters bidding had subsided for the time being and her new happy persona had only made her that much prettier. The only reason Draco could think of that would explain why she did not have a date would be intimidation. Guys were surely intimidated of her, because of her hauntingly beautiful looks and her violent quidditch skills.

Damn. Now he would have to find a date.

* * *

Who on earth could he ask? He thought, sitting on his bed, well, the bed he claimed in the seventh year dormitory, the dorm he preferred to live in. He hadn't even stepped in the sixth year dormitory yet this year. Who could he ask to help him find someone to ask?

Blaise. Before today, Blaise would have been the person he would have been brainstorming this list of potential choices with. Of course, if it wasn't for Blaise, he wouldn't have to be brainstorming anything. Darn this vicious circle.

He couldn't brainstorm on his own. He needed someone to bounce ideas off of.

"Is Jesse here?" Draco asked, poking his head in the fifth year dormitories.

"Hello." Jamie called back from somewhere invisible to Draco. "Who's there?"

"Jamie?" Draco called back. "Where are you?"

"Draco?"

"Yes, Jamie! Where are you?" He repeated his question. Jamie emerged from the bathroom, holding a tube of toothpaste.

"Brushing my teeth." He answered, holding up the tube.

"Is Jesse here?"

"Nope," Jamie replied, casually tossing his tooth brush and toothpaste on his dresser, making Draco cringe at the mess he was making, and then plopped himself down on his bed. "Want to hear something funny?"

Draco looked at him and then sat on one of the other four beds in the room. He was pretty sure the one he sat on was Jesse's but it could have been Paul's or Matt's, he really wasn't too sure. "This isn't the joke about the Hufflepuff, the hippogriff and the one eyed witch in the muggle shoe store again, is it?"

Jamie had a blank look for a second and then laughed, clearly he was remembering the joke. "No. It involves several of our fellow Slytherins. Almost as funny, but this more moronic and ironic than slapstick."

"Okay, so you know that I am over Corrine, right?" Jamie asked him. Draco nodded even though last time he saw them (which was that morning) he was under the impression that Jamie was still very much into Corrine. "Well, right, this afternoon, Clarissa came barreling in here, scaring the daylights out of Paul because he was still getting ready, Paul likes to sleep late on the weekends-" Draco liked Jamie as a person, he was always ready with a laugh or a crazy scheme that was bound to get at least four detentions, but Jamie tended to take awhile to get to the point whereas Jamie's best friend, Jesse, pardon the Corrine case, would just blurt out what he's wanting to say, going straight to the point. "-so anyway, Paul is startled and then Clarissa wants Jesse because she knows I'm over Corrine and I hadn't even told Clarissa yet, she is just that intuitive. So it turns out, this is the ironic funny part, that Corrine likes Joel, which is just plain crazy if you ask me, because Joel is two years older than Corrine and Corrine and Clarissa have always been pretty close. So Clarissa schemes that if Jesse asks Corrine out then Corrine will leave Joel alone, thus preventing Joel from leaving Clarissa. Now I know for a fact that Joel won't leave Clarissa for Corrine, I mean c'mon, Clarissa is supermodel material and Clarissa is like the only person Joel has hung out with for the past six plus years but she doesn't see that. You know how girls are."

"Well, that's kinda why I'm here..." Draco started to say but was cut off by an irrational Jamie.

"YOU LIKE CLARISSA?" Jamie gasped, standing up and pacing. "I can't handle this! No more relationship drama! Why does everyone come to Jamie with the relationship drama? I can't handle any more!"

"WHOA!" Draco said, placing his hands on Jamie's shoulder and stopping him. "I do not like Clarissa."

"Oh, thank Merlin, cause that would have made the other plan we schemed earlier, you know the one I told you about, so much more difficult it's not even ironic, moronic funny." Jamie breathed a sigh of relief.

"Who are you planning on going with to the Halloween dance feast thingy?" Draco asked, his vocabulary diminishing as his stress level increased.

"Why, did you want to go?" Jamie asked.

**_"Not with you!" _**Draco snapped, horrified that Jamie had thought that's what he was asking. "I meant who are you taking to the dance!"

Jamie looked like he was thinking. "I dunno." he answered. "I want to ask Jolie Taylor but I don't think I can."

"Who is Jolie Taylor?" Draco asked.

"C'mon," Jamie said, leading him out of the dormitories after glancing at his watch. "I'll show you."

"Hey, hey," Jamie said, grabbing a first or second year Ravenclaw by the arm. "Can ya get Kristen for me?"

"I thought you wanted to ask out Jolie?" Draco said, after the small boy ran into the entrance of the Ravenclaw common room.

"Kristen is my cousin." Jamie replied.

"You are asking out your cousin?" Draco asked in shock.

"NO!" Jamie snapped, looking disgusted. "I can't talk to Jolie without talking to Kristen. They are friends."

"Jamie!" A girl with natural blonde hair pulled into a side pony-tail adorned with a blue ribbon called out, running over to them. Draco looked at her again. She was cute.

"I was wondering who was asking for me by scaring first years." Kristen teased.

"I didn't scare him."

"I'm pretty sure you did."

"Well, it wasn't intentional." Jamie answered.

"So, what's up?" Kristen asked, bobbing her head, her pony-tail swaying. Draco found that look stupid on most people, but on her it was cute.

"Have you heard?" Jamie asked.

"The dance?" Kristen asked, bright blue eyes sparkling. "Yup. I cannot wait!"

"Me either."

"Listen, I was just on my way up to return this book to Professor Trelawney, mind if we walk and talk?" Kristen asked, already starting to walk, not waiting for a response, much like Jamie.

"Oh hey," Kristen said, just noticing him standing behind Jamie. "Great game yesterday."

"Thanks." Draco answered, shocked that someone who wasn't Slytherin supported the Slytherins.

"I've always been partial to Slytherins." Kristen shrugged, as if she read his mind. Kristen was better than Trelawney. "The Sorting Hat took nearly two minutes before it decided between Slytherin and Ravenclaw."

"Tell him why it chose Ravenclaw." Jamie said as they started climbing up stairs towards the North Tower.

Kristen blushed. "Because I asked it to because I had a crush on a boy that had just been sorted into Ravenclaw. Not the brightest thing I ever did, I understand, but I was only eleven. They should re-sort each year, people change you know."

Kristen climbed the ladder first to Trelawney's classroom. Jamie and Draco followed once she was in the classroom.

"Ahh, you come in threes." Trelawney breathed deep. "That is a very powerful number on a day like today."

"Sunday?" Jamie answered, clearly not a fan of divination.

"Well, yes, but it is also the day when a full moon arrives and Neptune comes into view." Trelawney explained. "Did you enjoy the book darling?"

"Why do you have to ask?" Jamie snickered to himself and Draco. "You should already know."

"The Inner Eye does not focus on such trivial matters." Trelawney snapped.

"Of course it can't focus if it doesn't exist." Jamie muttered.

"What?" Trelawney asked, turning away from Kristen and towards the two of them. Draco tried to look serious, but come on, it was Trelawney.

"Never mind, thank you for the book." Kristen said, ushering Jamie and Draco towards the door.

"So, why'd you come?" Kristen asked when all three were off the ladder and on the floor. "To harass an innocent teacher?"

"Jamie wants to ask you a question." Draco replied.

"About Jolie." Jamie hissed at Draco.

"Ah," Kristen said, implying she understood. Draco was sure she did, Jamie was hardly what you could call a complex person.

"Does she have a date?" Jamie asked impatiently.

"Not since the last time I talked to her." Kristen answered much to the delight of Jamie. Silence then ensued. "Would you like to talk to her?" Kristen asked finally.

Jamie nodded. Kristen motioned for them to follow her, she opened a door that Draco had never seen anyone use.

"That's not the way we came," Draco said.

Kristen smiled. "It's a shortcut but you can only use it to leave the North Tower. Follow me."

She walked to the end of another hallway after passing through three more doors and then sat down on the edge of the carpet, and suddenly Draco saw it, a large slide. That's why they couldn't go up that way.

"That was awesome." Jamie said when they reached the bottom, which took them straight to the hallway with the Ravenclaw entrance. "Let's do it again!"

"Jolie?" Draco reminded him.

"Right. Slide later." Jamie said more to himself than anyone else.

"Cover your ears." Kristen teased and then she whispered the Ravenclaw password (Draco thought that it was either "text book", "next cook", or "perplexed brook")

Draco stared in awe at the Ravenclaw common room. It was big, like the Slytherin one, but where the Slytherin one was cold and open, this was warm and cramped. The walls were bookshelves, filled to brim with books, some even overflowing onto the floor. It had several mismatched blue chairs and a few tables where students were doing homework. The fireplace was large and ablaze, lighting up the whole room, casting shadows in the corners.

"Kristen, what are you doing bringing Slytherins in here?" A girl with shoulder length black hair and blonde streaks said, coming over from her spot on the blue sofa. "Nice job." she smirked, eyeing them up. That was making Draco uncomfortable.

Jamie liked this girl? Sure, Draco thought, she was decent to look at, but she was so not Jamie. She was bold and blunt, with an apparent wild, dangerous side. Jamie got into dangerous situations but not because of a danger-seeking side but because of his apparent magnet for trouble. She looked tough and pessimistic. Jamie was rather weak looking, very slender and fit but not muscular, and was very optimistic. He was the class clown, she looked like she would punch the class clown.

"Come on, Draco," Kristen said, leading Draco away from Jamie and Jolie, whom Draco was sure by now knew what was going on. Clearly, she already knew Jamie.

"So great job the other day," Kristen repeated, sitting on the window seat. It faced the quidditch pitch. Draco liked the view. When he was with Blaise he saw the lake, when he was here he saw the quidditch pitch. One wasn't necessarily better, they were just different.

"Thanks." He repeated. "Do you play quidditch?"

"I'd like to." Kristen answered, staring at it. "But I've always played seeker when we play as family, and Cho is the seeker here, and you can't exactly challenge the quidditch captain to see if there is someone better for her position, so I have to wait until next year."

"That bites." Draco said.

"Yeah." Kristen said, looking at her hands in her lap. "So are you going to the dance?"

Draco nodded.

Kristen looked slightly hurt. "Oh, so you already have a date."

"No, but hopefully I'll find one." He answered, completely unaware of the attractive blonde girl next to him.

Kristen stared at her hands a little longer. "Would you like to go with me?" She blurted out. She stole a quick glance at Draco and then turned her attention to the quidditch pitch where it looked like Gryffindor was practicing.

Wow, Draco was taken back by this question. It hit him hard and fast, catching him completely off guard. However, she was the answer to his problem with Blaise. He had found an almost Slytherin Ravenclaw to be his date, and a cute one at that. "I'd like that." He said, smiling at her. Kristen beamed back. Maybe this would work out. He didn't like Blaise like that, he reasoned. He thought Kristen was cute and Kristen was pretty cool so far and Kristen seemed to like him back. Kristen was perfect. His date Kristen was perfect. He liked that.

"You want to go to dinner together?" Draco asked and she smiled again, although the first smile never really left her face.

"Where do we sit?" Kristen asked when they reached the Great Hall.

Draco hadn't thought about this until she mentioned it. "Well, the Slytherin table is a little less crowded..."

"I'm not going to be hexed for being in Slytherin territory?" Kristen asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Nah, we only hex Gryffindors." Draco teased and Kristen laughed.

Kristen sat on the bench closest to the Ravenclaw table, Draco sat on the other side.

"This is the Slytherin table." Pansy snapped. Draco hadn't noticed her, she was sitting at the far end of the table.

"We were well aware of that!" Draco shouted back.

Draco quickly learned a lot about Kristen Hart; she liked to talk, which was good because Draco preferred to listen than to talk himself. She was older than Jamie by almost three months, her birthday was May 31st, and they were related through their dads, who were brothers. Kristen had three ex-boyfriends, Ethan, a boy from Beauxbatons she met on holiday, a seventh year Ravenclaw named Parker, and a sixth year Ravenclaw named Jon. Ethan dumped her because they never saw each other, Parker was obsessed and drove her crazy, and Jon moved to Los Angeles and now goes to a school in Salem, which is only a few hours by train from L.A., Kristen was allergic to anything dairy; she had a very sensitive stomach. She absolutely loved the beach, which is where all the cousins and everyone met up during the summer. Her family had a beach house that was called the East Blue something or other in the States.

"Do you ever go to the beach?" Kristen asked Draco. She touched his hand, "You are very pale."

"I don't tan." He answered. "I'm always pale."

"Me too." Kristen said. "Except when I go out, I gain more freckles. We will be the palest people at the dance!"

"Humpf!" A voice behind him huffed and then footsteps leading away followed.

Draco turned around, expecting to see Pansy and Millicent, but instead saw Blaise Zabini, hurrying out of the Great Hall, nearly taking out the very first year Ravenclaw Jamie scared earlier in an attempt to get out of there.

"I take it she's an ex?" Kristen asked, but it was more of a statement than a question.

An ex?

Was that how he and Blaise were acting?

Was it over before it actually begun?

What the hell was he thinking asking himself questions like that?

He didn't like Blaise like that.

He wanted to like Kristen.

He didn't like Blaise like that.

Did he?

* * *

Thank you so much for reading! Please, please review! Also, the next chapter may not be up for at least a week because I start college for the first time on Saturday and I will have to get into routine before I have time to update, so I apologize in advance for the delay, but I will try to post as quickly as possible.

Dolface546: Thank you so much for reviewing!

Siss: Thank you so much!

Marie Terensky: Isn't Simple Plan a great band? I love them. Thanks for the review!

Feilian: Thank you so much for reading and reviewing!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	7. I Can Dream About You

Hanging By a Moment Chapter Seven

Disclaimer: Jolie, Jamie, Jesse, Joel, Bradin, Priscilla, Piper, Paige, Kristen, Paul, Belle, Clarissa, and Madrigal are mine. Draco, Blaise, Graham, McGonagall, and Pansy are J.K. Rowling's. "I Can Dream About You" is property of Dan Hartman's and his record label.

* * *

**Chapter Seven: I Can Dream About You**

_**I can dream about you**_

_**If I can't hold you tonight**_

_**I can dream about you**_

_**You know how to hold me just right**_

****

_**I can dream about you**_

_**I'm gonna press my lips against you **_

_**And hold you to me**_

_**You know you've got me spellbound **_

****

_**What can it be**_

_**I don't understand it**_

**_I can't keep my mind off loving you_**

_**Oh, now baby, I'm caught in the magic I see in you**_

_**There's one thing to do**_

****

_**I can dream about you**_

_**If I can't hold you tonight**_

_**I can dream about you**_

****

_**I Can Dream About You by Dan Hartman

* * *

**_

"And you'll never guess what Jolie said..." Jamie rambled on to Draco, who had given up on listening around the time that Jamie had explained what drove Jolie to dye her hair such contrasting shades.

"Shut up!" Jesse snapped, throwing an emerald green pillow at Jamie's head. Jesse, being a beater, had such good aim, that not only did it hit Jamie square in the head, it bounced and hit Paul. Paul, whom Draco thought could be Jesse's clone with dark brown hair instead of blonde, just laughed and then threw it back at Jamie.

"Hey!" Jamie growled, but did nothing about it. He never did.

"You deserved it." Paul replied.

"You are going with Belle?" Jesse asked.

"Of course." Paul answered.

"Belle?" Draco asked.

Paul nodded. "Girlfriend. Fifth year Ravenclaw." He answered in a truly Slytherin way; providing as little information as possible while still answering the question. Draco hated that, even though he knew very well that he was champion of the no-information-short-answer.

"Oh." Draco said, for lack of anything better to say.

"Who are you going with?" Paul asked accusingly.

"Kristen." Jamie answered before Draco could.

"Thanks." Draco hissed.

"I introduced them." Jamie told Paul and Jesse, completing missing the fact that Draco's sarcasm was for answering for him, not a genuine thank you for introducing him to Kristen.

"And how is Blaise taking this?" Jesse said, rising to his feet.

"What do you mean by that?" Draco hissed, a little more pissed off than he should have let on.

"Nothing," Jesse replied. Draco thought he saw Jamie and Jesse exchange a look, Paul looked less than enthusiastic, but Paul did not know Blaise or Draco as well as Jesse and Jamie, not saying that Jamie and Jesse knew all of their fellow quidditch team that well.

* * *

"Trade you half of my tuna salad for half of your peanut butter and jelly." Kristen said, waving around half a wheat bread sandwich.

"Sure." Draco said; giving her half of his sandwich even though there was no way that he was touching the tuna fish. Tuna and peanut butter didn't mix. He suddenly felt angered at Kristen for being so stupid and he did not know why. Why should it matter that her taste buds were from a different planet?

"Aw, first year puppy love," Pansy Parkinson crowed from behind the bench that Kristen and Draco were sitting on.

"Hi Pansy." Kristen replied, once she swallowed the bite of her new found peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Pansy looked downright pissed. Draco smiled knowing that his date was angering her. Maybe she would finally leave him alone. He doubted that. The one person he wanted to pay attention would not give him the time of day. Since the night she had stormed out of the Great Hall, which was only a mere two days ago but it felt like forever to him, she had given him the cold shoulder, ducked down a different corridor, or flat out pretended that he did not exist when they were in groups. How could she avoid him like that? They were the lone sixth year Slytherins. They had to stick together. She did not even have a right to be pissed. What he said was truthful. Blaise and he did not have many other friends. Without the quidditch team, he really would not have any friends other than her. Now he did not even have her. He had Kristen.

"McGonagall gave us this horrendous assignment, I have to write like three feet on transfiguring a flower into fireworks and what the ramifications are if the flowers are not truly transfigured before they start exploding." Kristen rambled on, trying to fill the empty silence. "Did you have that assignment last year?"

"No." Draco answered, even though he honestly did not know. Like he cared about transfiguration or McGonagall. That was a Gryffindor class.

"We had that assignment." Pansy hissed, plopping down on the bench across from them. "I helped you with it, remember?"

Draco snorted. "The day you helped me with homework? Pardon me, my father never had to bribe any governors to make sure that I stayed with this class and was not moved to the one a year below us."

"That is a lie!" Pansy screeched, although Draco knew it was true. He had heard Mr. Parkinson complaining about his youngest daughter. Her older sisters were held in high esteem by her parents, Pansy seemed to be a bit of a failure (just because of her stupidity) compared to them. Piper Parkinson was clearly her father's favorite, although Piper had been dead since Pansy was a year old, somehow she had died with something involving the Dark Lord's plans going wrong, she was at the wrong place at the wrong time or something. Paige Parkinson was married to a prominent Death Eater, Draco could not remember which one; it really did not matter to him. Priscilla Parkinson had graduated only the year before and was a brilliant transfiguration student, Draco knew that she was an illegal Animagi for the Death Eaters. Nobody would ever suspect a fluffy white cat of being so evil. Now that Draco thought about it, if Pansy had a paper written for transfiguration, it was probably either written by or stolen from Priscilla.

"Pansy you _never_ helped me with a paper. You must be confusing the situation with _Priscilla_ helping _you._"

"Priscilla is a stupid prat." Pansy hissed, sounding like an evil cat, only not being able to transfigure into one. Draco noticed she didn't try to deny it. She knew that Draco had caught her and that he would know if she was lying. Best decision in her case would be to drop it and pray that no one would continue the conversation. Normally Draco would not give anyone this satisfaction, but this was Pansy, and he would do anything possible to end this conversation as soon as he could.

"Whatever." He answered, taking a bite of the half of sandwich left in his lap. Tuna fish, gross.

* * *

"What are you doing?"

Draco jumped out of skin. He was sitting in a dusty, rarely visited portion of the library; the middle of the Ancient Languages section. How did she find him?

"Studying." He answered, thrusting the piece of parchment he had been writing on into his bag.

"You were writing something." Kristen said, sitting on the chair next to him, resting her head in her hands, giving Draco her undivided attention.

"Homework." He answered.

"For what?" She asked, perkily. Why would she not shut up?

"Uh, potions."

"Then why are you in the Ancient Languages section?" She kept asking questions, as if she was suspicious, but Draco was not under the impression that that was why she was asking. She just wanted to know what was going on in his life. Weird and very annoying.

"It's quiet over here." Draco said, trying to subtly hint that it was no longer quiet thanks to her.

"Oh, yeah it is." Kristen replied, clearly not getting that he wanted to be left alone. The more he hung out with her, the more he noticed the relation between her and Jamie.

Draco turned back to the potions book that he had left lying open in front of him as his cover. Kristen just watched as he pretended to read. Why wouldn't she leave? It couldn't possibly be interesting to watch him study. He just wanted to be alone. Not alone. Just away from most everyone else.

"Are you going to watch me study?" Draco asked her, no longer caring about subtly.

"If you don't mind." Kristen answered with a smile.

"Um, it's kind of distracting." He replied.

"You find me distracting?" Kristen grinned, clearly taking this as the biggest compliment ever. "Okay, I'll leave, but come find me when you're done, okay?"

"Sure." Draco answered, although he was pretty sure that he had no intentions of going to find her.

"I'll see you later, my little bookworm." She teased, wrapping her arms around his neck and planting a kiss on his lips.

"Kristen, we're not dating." Draco said when she pulled away, suddenly hit with the feeling that he didn't want her to leave. He didn't like it, nor want it. He wanted her to go; he wanted to want her to go. But he didn't.

"Not yet anyway," she said with a smile and walked out of the Ancient Languages Section knowing very well that she had toyed with his heart.

Draco felt flushed. Why, why did she do that? He liked the kiss. He liked kissing. He liked kissing her. He wanted to be kissing someone else though. Someone that certainly didn't want to kiss him. But here he had someone that wanted to kiss him and someone that he now wanted to kiss back, yet he still wanted the one that didn't want him. What was wrong with this picture? He had the perfect opportunity for a relationship with someone that wanted one and yet he was holding out for what he couldn't have. Why was he so stupid?

He pulled the rolled up piece of parchment out of his lap. He no longer knew what to say in his letter to Blaise. He would try and finish it later. Later. When he was supposed to meet Kristen.

* * *

"So are you and Kristen official?" A crisp, cold voice behind him muttered, sending a chill down his spine. Why did people always approach him from behind? Couldn't anyone just ever walk towards him and avoid the creepy factor? Apparently that would be too much to ask.

"What?" he asked, turning around to face his accuser, she was standing behind the emerald green sofa.

"Are you dating Kristen?" Blaise asked, her perfectly sculpted eyebrows arched. "You have Pansy in hysterics, you heartbreaker."

"I'm not dating Kristen." Draco answered, his thoughts immediately trailing back to their first kiss a mere two days ago. And their next kiss that night and their next kiss even later that night…this list continued for awhile.

"So you're just snogging her?" Blaise asked, sitting next to him on the sofa.

"What, no-" Draco tried to explain but stopped. Blaise was sitting next to him. That was odd. Blaise was talking to him. Even odder. Then it hit him harder than a bludger to the head.

"So who are you going with?" He asked, looking at her.

Blaise moved her long dark hair off her shoulder and arched her eyebrows. "Excuse me?"

"You found a date." Draco stated, no longer asking, he was sure now that she had a date. "Who is it?"

"None of your business." She answered, this was infuriating him. He wanted to know. He _needed_ to know. Mostly so he could go jinx the hell out of him.

"You know who I am going with." Draco reasoned.

Blaise snickered. "That's not my fault. If you didn't want me to know who you were going with than you shouldn't have (a) told Jamie and (b) snogged her all over the school."

Draco was furious. This was not fair. Who else wanted Blaise? He could understand why they would want her, but seriously did everyone not know that they were meant to be? They were meant to be!

* * *

Draco shivered. It was freezing in the dormitory. He sat up in bed. The window was open, Joel was gone. Off with Clarissa somewhere he imagined.

"Merlin, you scared me," Draco said, turning around after shutting the window.

"I'm sorry." She said, wrapping her arms around his waist and leaning her head against his chest, her ear touching the English Quidditch logo on his tee-shirt.

"No, it's a good surprise." He assured her, hugging her back, smoothing out her dark brown hair.

"Good." She answered. "It's cold in here."

"Joel left the window open."

"He's with Clarissa."

"I would assume so."

"Why are you so cold?" She asked.

"I told you Joel left the window open." Draco repeated, rubbing her back, the two still hugging.

"Why are you so cold?" She repeated into his tee-shirt.

"The _window."_ Draco said, this time pointing although her eyes were closed.

"Why are you so cold?" She muttered sleepily, her eyes still closed and her voice a mere whisper.

"Blaise?"

"Why are you so cold?"

"Why are you so cold?"

"Draco, why are you so cold?"

Draco sat up in bed, freezing and panicked. She was gone. He continued to breathe heavily for a few seconds before realizing that she was never there. Joel was there, his hair sticking up funny and his arm wrenched tightly around a pillow, half of his blankets on the floor. Draco turned the window, it wasn't open. That wasn't the reason he was so cold. Maybe Blaise meant something else after all.

* * *

"Blaise, you'll never guess what happened last-" Draco stopped after realizing that the girl on the sofa wasn't Blaise. It was Madrigal, the first year that did not look eleven in the least. But from behind the sofa, she had the same dark brown hair.

"Blaise isn't here." Madrigal answered in her sing-song voice. "She went to breakfast. Have you seen Bradin?"

"Bradin?" Draco repeated, unable to remember the boy.

"He's my age." Madrigal answered. Which was anywhere from what eleven to sixteen? Draco thought, but held his tongue.

"No, I haven't." He answered, not knowing Bradin if he had ran up and smacked him on the forehead. No, if he had done that, Draco probably would have remembered him. Never mind.

"He's probably with Nora." Madrigal sulked. Draco didn't have the patience or the desire to even bother asking who that was. He thought she might be the other first year, that would make sense, but he could not be bothered to remember the names of the first years he never dealt with.

Draco looked in the Great Hall, he suddenly had the burning desire to find Blaise; he had to find her. He had to make things right. He knew it. Blaise was all he had. She was his best friend. A best friend that he needed to get back.

"Draco!" Kristen called from her spot at the Ravenclaw table. "Come eat with us!"

Draco ignored her. Blaise was not at breakfast like Madrigal had said. Stupid Madrigal.

"Draco!"

Draco kept walking. He did not want to deal with her. He had no patience for her. Not anymore. Not when he was preoccupied with what he thought were the subliminal messages from Blaise in his dreams as silly as they sounded, deep in his chest he knew there was something behind them.

"Blaise?" He asked Graham as he passed by him at the table. Graham motioned to the food stuffed in his mouth and his older brother's significant other answered.

"Went for a walk." Clarissa replied, smacking Graham for having so much food in his mouth. He choked a bit.

Draco rushed out the side doors which led right to bridge where Blaise and Draco had their near death accident only weeks earlier.

He had to tell Blaise about his dream. He had to make it up to her before it was too late.

Draco froze in his tracks. It already was.

* * *

Author's Note: Yes, I know, this took forever for me to write. I hope to finish several more chapters now that winter break is rapidly approaching. I am going to start a new chapter this week, but seeing as how it is almost the holidays and I, like everyone else, have six bazillion things to do before then, I am not quite sure that I will have the next one posted this week. Hopefully, I'll be wrong about that but I don't think so, because I want to update my other stories as well. On that note, if I don't update before then, I would like to wish everyone a Happy Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, and Happy Boxing Day!

Also, I can no longer post the responses to reviews with each chapter, but if you have a question and you leave it in the review, I will respond to it. You can also leave comments or questions on my livejournal page or send me an e-mail or instant message, I'm always happy to talk. : ) Thanks for the reviews for last chapter and thanks in advance for the reviews for this chapter.

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	8. A Little Less Sixteen Candles

**Chapter 8: A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More Touch Me**

**I confess, I messed up**

**Dropping "I'm sorry" like you're still around**

**And I know, you're dressed up**

**Hey kid, you'll never live this down**

**You're just the girl all the boys want to dance with**

**And I'm just the boy who's had too many chances**

**I'm sleeping on your folk's porch again, dreaming**

**She said, she said, she said**

"**Why don't you just drop dead?"**

**I don't blame you for being you**

**But you can't blame me for hating it**

**So say "What are you waiting for?**

**Kiss her, kiss her"**

**I set my clocks early because I know I'm always late**

**Write me off, give up on me, 'cause**

"**Darling, what did you expect?"**

**I'm just off, a lost cause**

**A long shot, don't even take this bet**

**I'm sleeping on your folk's porch again, dreaming**

**She said, she said, she said**

"**Why don't you just drop dead?"**

**I don't blame you for being you**

**But you can't blame me for hating it**

**So say "What are you waiting for?**

**Kiss her, kiss her"**

**I set my clocks early because I know I'm always late

* * *

**

DEAN THOMAS?

He was losing Blaise to DEAN THOMAS?

Oh, this move was not going to fly.

Draco spun around in mid-step, nearly tripping and burst back into the Great Hall. He kept walking past Pansy, who was calling his name, Clarissa who was yelling at Graham, Goyle who was trying to see how many French toast sticks he could fit into his mouth at once, Cho Chang who was showing everyone the new bag her mother had sent her, Luna Lovegood who was stirring her oatmeal violently, Hermione Granger who was reading the Daily Prophet, Seamus Finnigan who was arguing with Ron Weasley, Harry Potter who was eating his pancake, until –

He reached Ginny Weasley who was staring off into space. "Ginny." He said, tapping her on the shoulder. By now, he could feel several pairs of eyes boring into his skull. Ron had stopped arguing, Hermione had stopped reading, Harry had stopped eating, Kristen had started fuming-

"Don't touch her, Malfoy." Ron said, causing Ginny to snap to attention.

"What are you doing?" Kristen harped, rushing over from the Ravenclaw table.

"Ginny, we need to talk," Draco said, ignoring both Ron and Kristen, two people who were not taking well to being ignored.

"What?" Ginny asked, as if she had just woken up.

"Talk. Alone. Without these two pain in the asses." He said, not thinking before he spoke. Ron burned scarlet and Kristen practically billowed steam out of her ears.

"Stay away from him!" Kristen growled, moving in between Draco and Ginny. Ginny stepped around her, clearly unafraid of the blonde Ravenclaw.

"Let's go," Ginny said in a way, that made Draco think that she may have been expecting this conversation.

"You go with her and I'll –" Kristen started to say but was cut off by Draco.

"You'll do what?" He snapped. He had no time for this nonsense. Kristen had been getting on his nerves more and more ever since she asked him to the dance, and now it seemed he had the perfect opportunity to get rid of her.

"Go with someone else to the dance!" Kristen screeched. By now, several more Gryffindors and Luna Lovegood were watching.

"Be sure to tell me who so I can send them a sympathy card!" He hollered back before walking out with Ginny.

"I HATE YOU, DRACO MALFOY!"

* * *

Draco led Ginny down the hall for a few minutes until they had finally lost the last of the lot following them. (Kristen, Ron, Pansy, Rose Zeller….the list continued)

"Dean." Draco said.

"We broke up." Ginny said, folding her arms across her chest.

"He's with Blaise." Draco said, not able to come up with any sentence more advanced than that.

"I know." Ginny said. "They are going to the dance tonight. Apparently they have a lot in common."

"What the hell do they have in common?" Draco asked, suddenly quite aware that now he was not going to the dance.

"They're beaters?" Ginny suggested, clearly not knowing why.

"This dance was the dumbest idea ever." Draco hissed.

"Tell me about it." Ginny snarled, surprising Draco. He thought for sure that she would defend her precious Dumbledore's idea.

"You're not going?" Draco asked, quite surprised. After all, this was Ginny Weasley, the second prettiest girl in the school, in his opinion.

"I am going with Seth Beriatti." Ginny swung back.

"Seth has a girlfriend at Salem." Draco pointed out.

"We're going as friends." Ginny said of the seventh year Ravenclaw. "And you can't make fun of me, your date left you."

"Thank god, she is gone." He said of Kristen.

"I cannot believe that you went out with Kristen Hart." Ginny laughed. "I thought even you had better taste."

"I never went out with her." Draco replied. "Anyway, I'm friends with her cousin, he set us up to go to the dance."

"You couldn't find your own date?" Ginny laughed, and Draco was suddenly crossed with the thought that Ginny was much nicer a few weeks ago.

"I couldn't go with who I wanted to because she was a Slytherin," Draco defended himself, not realizing until after he had said it that he implied that he liked Blaise.

"Dean is trying to hurt me and you." Ginny confessed. "I was talking to you and that hurt him and he knows that you are only really close to Blaise and so he could hurt you by taking her away from you."

"Stupid prat." Draco said, jealous of Dean's manipulative, Slytherin like ways. "And Blaise wants to hurt me, so she went with him."

"Don't you hate when the ones you love turn against you?" Ginny said, sinking to the floor next to Draco. Draco assumed that she still loved Dean. Which meant that Dean was an even bigger jerk than he imagined.

"Oh, yeah," he muttered to her. She glanced at him and he gave her a smile.

"So, you're not going tonight?" She asked, trying to make conversation.

"Doesn't look that way." Draco honestly answered. He didn't know why he could talk to the female Weasley. He just could. "I can't go with any Slytherins, Gryffindors and I don't exactly mix, every Ravenclaw will be supportive of Kristen and no offense, but the Hufflepuffs are a little –"

"Be glad you're not going to this dance." Ginny sighed. "It's not worth it."

"But you're going?" Draco said, arching his eyebrow.

"Dean is an asshole and assholes should not win. I have a date. I'm not a loser." Ginny said.

"Oh, thanks, I'm the loser without a date." Draco half-joked.

"No, you're the guy that cares for someone so much that they want to fight for her. You're not afraid to be left behind without a date, because you want to prove that you care for her." Ginny answered honestly. "Blaise is the one who is afraid to be hurt and alone."

Draco wished that Blaise was the only one that was afraid to be hurt and alone. But he knew, deep down, that she was far stronger than he could ever dream to be.

* * *

The Slytherin dormitories had never ever been that particularly noisy. The excitement of the rapidly approaching dance from students that were going and the whiny teasing of those who weren't going but wanted to and the grumbling of those who wanted nothing to do with dance, filled the room.

"Who are you going to dance with, Joel?" Corinne asked as Draco entered the common room.

"I'm not going." He answered, his girlfriend's arm tightly clenched around his waist. "Clarissa and I are staying here."

"Well, I'm going with Alexander Cabot, he's just a friend, don't you worry –"

"He wasn't worried." Clarissa interjected.

"- and he's got some friends if you perhaps wanted to come with us, Jordana Palass is quite pretty, you could be her date but we could perhaps switch and share a dance or two, I'm sure Jordana and Alexander won't mind."

"But Clarissa might," Draco heard Jesse whisper to Corinne. She ignored him.

Joel just stood there. Clarissa glared. "I'd listen to Jesse." She warned Corinne.

"Suit yourself. I'll give you full details when I get back though. Let's just say, I think some of those couples who decided to find dates for this dance, are going to permanently split up."

She skipped off, getting Christina to help her with her hair.

"And I'm sure little boyfriend stealer over there will be right there to help the splitting up of those couples." Clarissa hissed, pointing a perfectly manicured finger at Corinne, causing Joel to grab her hand and plant a kiss on her cheek. She wasn't happy, but she looked reassured that "the boyfriend stealer" would have to do a little better than that show to take Joel away.

"Tie." Graham said, plopping down on the arm chair adjacent to Joel and Clarissa. It took Draco a second to realize what he meant, but Clarissa knew instantly, abandoning Joel to fix the mess around Graham's neck.

"Honestly," She said, nearly strangling him as she tried to fix the knot he had managed. "Who would agree to go to a dance with you? I _still_ have marks from that time last year when I tried to teach you to ballroom dance."

"I said I was sorry about that! Geez! Will you ever let me live it down?" Graham muttered, now with a straight tie and the ability to breathe.

"I'll drop it the day you manage to dance with a girl without her leaving with a bruise." Clarissa teased.

"You won't drop it," Joel laughed, putting his arms around Clarissa's waist and pulling her onto his lap.

"You're right, I won't." She laughed and turned to kiss her beau.

"You two are sickening." Graham muttered and Draco had to silently agree with the fourth year. Of course, it was not so him being grossed out by Clarissa and Joel's public displays of affection, like it was for Graham, as it was jealousy that he did not have what they had. The most serious relationship he had ever had was Kristen. He realized how pathetic that was and it only worsened his mood further.

* * *

Over the next hour, his mood slightly improved due to a hilarious episode of Jamie stepping on Corinne's dress and ripping the hem, which sent Clarissa rolling on the floor, practically hyperventilating while Corinne was sobbing and smacked Jesse, who was only trying to comfort her when he made the tear worse.

"Corinne, stop crying," She said and suddenly the hem was fixed, the damage vanished.

Draco didn't want to, but he turned around on pure reaction to see her. He saw what he had been afraid to see. She was beautiful. Drop dead beautiful. Her pale skin contrasted lovely with her emerald green dress with the silver ribbon straps and silver ribbon around the waist. Her silky dark brown hair was pulled back with a matching silver ribbon. Her trademark locket still hung from her pale neck, the locket dangling near a lone freckle on her chest. Her brilliant green eyes were outlined with eyeliner of coal color and a hint of silver sparkle. She was the epitome of perfect in Draco's eyes.

"Mmmm." And apparently in Jesse's eyes too.

"Thank you," Corinne muttered sheepishly, ashamed that she had not thought of the charm herself. She wiped her eyes and Draco saw that her eye makeup had smudged. No one said anything to her, not even Jamie or Jesse.

"You look lovely, Blaise." Clarissa said, without an ounce of jealously in her voice, something that Draco realized she rarely did.

"Thank you," she said, deliberate to avoid Draco's eye contact. "Well, I ought to go. Good bye." She said, picking up the hem of her dress and heading out of the Slytherin common room towards wherever traitorous place she was to meet Dean.

"Bye," Draco whispered back to her, although he was sure, no one, especially her, had heard him. "I'm sorry."

"Damn." Jesse breathed out as soon as Blaise was out of earshot.

Now, Draco had known Jesse for years. Jesse had always loved girls. Like always. He never had that typical eleven year old boy phase where girls were drooling over guys and the guys still thought girls were from another realm. Jesse was always attracted to them. So he had always talked about them. Never in a particularly vulgar way, he was fairly good about that. He just made his feelings clear on who he thought was particularly fine. Although, this time Draco felt the sudden urge to smack him when he had never felt that way about the many comments Jesse had made about Corinne, Clarissa, Lavender Brown, Madrigal Evans, Ginny Weasley, Luna Lovegood (Draco was still a little baffled by that one), and the list continued on and on.

Draco suddenly could no longer sit there with the Benedict Arnold formerly known as Jesse and the sickening lovebirds. He darted out of the common room, through the entrance and down the hall, just in time to see a flicker of emerald green flip around the corner. He took of running in that direction.

"BLAISE!" he yelled when he had reached the perpendicular corridor. The beauty of the ball spun around, her silver ribbon catching the light from the palladium window at the end of the hall.

She stopped, but she did not say anything. Draco was disappointed, but her stopping was more than he had expected.

Draco continued running down the hall, slowing down as he reached her. He was out of breath by the time he had reached her, although he was in top physical shape, and was unable to say anything.

"Blaise." He breathed, trying to catch his breath, his hands planted on his knees.

"Good, you know my name. It's only October, didn't take you too long, now did it?" She snapped, folding her pale, fragile arms across her chest.

"Will you hear me out?" Draco said.

"I've been listening to you." Blaise replied. "And all you have said is my name, which quite frankly isn't that great, so I really don't want to spend my night standing here while you repeat it over and over again."

"Blaise," Draco said instantly regretting it because it clearly signaled to her that he had not been listening, all though he very well had, it was just that his brain did not process fast enough to keep pace with her.

"Draco." She snapped back.

"Don't go." He said, moving closer towards her.

"And why should I not go?" She asked, glancing over her shoulder.

"Just please don't." He said, knowing that he had very well reached a level of whining.

* * *

"You're very convincing, you know that?" She replied.

"I'm glad." Draco said, running his fingers through her silky hair.

"Me too," she smiled before turning and taking a book out of her bag.

"What's that?" Draco asked, glancing over her shoulder at it, leaving his fingers gently resting on her shoulder.

"My favorite book in the whole world." Blaise said, hugging it to her chest.

Draco glanced at it. It wasn't what he expected it was a book of-

Draco sat straight up in bed. He had fallen asleep. He hadn't known when. He certainly had not fallen asleep right away. He had been cursed with thoughts of Blaise having a wonderful time at the dance. All he could see was that cold look on her face when she turned and left him standing in that cobwebbed corridor all alone.

That cold look. That look was seared into his brain.

Not a murderous cold look but a lonely cold look.

A cold, left-alone-in-a-cemetery-at-midnight-in-a-rainstorm look.

A look that was on the face of the one person that could wipe that very look off of his own face.

And he had put it on hers.

* * *

Please, please review! I really need motivation. And another six hours in every day. But right now, I'll just settle for motivation. Please, please review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	9. Helplessly, Hopelessly

Chapter Nine: Helplessly, Hopelessly

_**I can stand with the weight of the world on my shoulders**_

_**I can fight with the toughest of the tough**_

_**I can laugh in the face of all my insecurities**_

**_Anytime, anywhere, anything I'm strong enough_**

_**But when you're holding me like this**_

_**I'm carelessly lost in your touch**_

_**I'm completely defenseless**_

_**Baby, its almost too much**_

_**I'm helplessly, hopelessly, recklessly falling in love**_

_**So let consequence to do us what it will, I don't care**_

_**Let the stars stand as witness to it all**_

_**Say the word and tonight I will follow you anywhere**_

_**I just can't pretend anymore I'm too sturdy to fall**_

'_**Cause when you're holding me like this**_

_**I'm carelessly lost in your touch**_

_**I'm completely defenseless**_

_**Baby, its almost too much**_

_**I'm helplessly, hopelessly, recklessly falling in love**_

_**But I'm not afraid anymore**_

_**Helplessly, Hopelessly by Jessica Andrews**_

_**

* * *

**_

"Hey stranger."

"Mmpfh." Draco replied, burying his head under his favorite pillow. He rarely used the other three that graced his bed.

"I feel the same way."

"Huh?" Draco wondered. He was so out of it that he couldn't tell if he had said that aloud or simply wondered it.

She put her hand over his. He was now awake.

"Blaise?" He asked, knocking the once favored pillow to floor like it was the redhead stepchild of the pillow world. "What are you doing here?"

Blaise took this as an invitation to remain in his bed. She kicked off her ballet flats and settled into one of the remaining pillows on the bed, so her head was level with his.

"So, I went to this dance and well, -it sucked." She said, looking up at his ceiling like it was the most fascinating thing she'd seen all night. The most baffling part of this was that her admiration towards the ceiling seemed genuine.

"Oh." Draco was at a loss for words. Not hours earlier, she had seemed so hurt by him. Now she was sitting a mere few feet away from him.

"-and I was like, I know whose entertaining. There's this blonde fellow that lives near me; I knew HE'D entertain me, much more so than my date."

"Did you find this blonde fellow?" Draco teased.

Blaise turned and smiled. "No, but I figured you were a good second."

Draco tickled her for that, knowing she was teasing. "Stop," she laughed, gasping for air.

"Shh, Joel's sle-" Draco started to say

"No he isn't." Blaise said. "He's out with Clarissa."

"Oh." Draco couldn't tell in the dark. He swore he had been there earlier.

"I didn't realize how tired I was." Blaise yawned after a few silent seconds. They were not uncomfortable silent seconds; in fact, they were quite nice. No awkwardness about it for once.

They laid there in silence for a little awhile.

"Blaise?"

"Mmmmhmm?" She muttered quite sleepily.

"Are we okay?"

"You chased after me."

"Huh?" Draco asked, sitting up so he could see her face. Her eyes were closed, her breathing steady. She was talking in her sleep.

"I just wanted to know you cared."

"Of course, I care." He said, brushing the hair out of her face. Her silver ribbon was now askew.

"Thank you." She whispered into the pillow; Draco's least favorite one. Suddenly, he had a feeling that that might change.

"Blaise?"

"Yeah, I know, I'm leaving in a second. Your pillow….is just so comforting."

* * *

"No, you need birch bark, not just bark." Blaise corrected Draco, taking the liberty to add the word in with her own quill.

"Why?" Draco whined, not wanting to recopy his potions essay again. He already had to once due to an accident involving the ink bottle and Graham. Enough said.

"Birch has a special property that other types of bark do not have." Blaise said, reading the rest of Draco's essay. "And you spelled this wrong."

"This is the last time I let you read my paper." Draco grumbled.

"You are just having an off night, you never do this bad." Blaise answered honestly.

A stampede, or what sounded like one, came hurling in the common room, so loud that Theodore Nott nearly fell out of his chair.

"All I'm saying is that Snape better get that damn broomstick out of his ass." Jesse hissed to Paul, his fellow fifth year, as he wrung the life out of the parchment in his hand.

"Bad day?" Blaise asked, quill still lingering over Draco's parchment

"I got an Acceptable! An acceptable! Not an outstanding, not even an 'exceeds expectations' but an acceptable!" Jesse yelped.

Blaise looked at Jesse in confusion, but Draco however had known Jesse pretty well for five years, but they had been acquaintances much longer. Surprisingly, Jesse was an academic master, potions being his specialty. Draco, who was no potions dummy himself, had even asked Jesse, a year his junior, for help, but if asked he would vehemently deny it. And Jesse would understand. Slytherin code of conduct; show no weakness, protect your comrades from showing theirs.

That was the sign of a true friend.

* * *

"The Inner Eye sees many things, great things of significant importance. Important things of great significance…"

"Remind me, why the hell we signed up for Advanced Divination?" Draco muttered.

Clarissa sighed. "It was supposed to be an easy Outstanding."

"That's right." Draco said with nod. "What happened to that plan?"

"Trelawney happened." Clarissa grumbled, smushing a tea leaf with her spoon. Trelawney now began every lesson with a cup of tea. Draco had begun to hate tea and anything associated with it; tea cups, tea pots, tee pees, biscotti….

"Miss Hawthorne, that leaf is something that should be treated with the upmost respect." Trelawney said, as if Clarissa's smushing was of great personal offense to her. "You and Mister Malfoy seem to think that it is merely a piece of sewage."

"Hmm, maybe she's psychic after all." Draco said, after Trelawney wandered over to yell at Caitlin Rogers and Gwen McClellan for something involving some of the biscotti.

"Put that tea cozy down right now, Mr Coldstoneford!" Trelawney said. "How long before this is over?"

"Forty nine minutes," Trey Coldstoneford, Clarissa, and a sleepy-eyed Ravenclaw muttered in unison.

Trelawney sighed loudly and rubbed her forehead as if she had a terrible headache. "All right, let's settle down. I was going to save this for the end of the term, but since we seem to be having cabin fever today, I think I a fun lesson is due."

"Depends on whose idea of fun it is." Clarissa replied, not even bothering to whisper.

"Just pull out your crystal ball, Miss Hawthorne. All of you, Crystal Balls out." Trelawney said, wearily as she sat behind the large ball on her desk, her ring finger delicately tracing her name that was carved on the onyx base on which the ball sat. She claimed it was a gift from Cassandra herself. But Draco was pretty sure that his mother had ordered one just like that Colt Crystal just a few months ago, and Cassandra had been dead for at least a decade now.

"Now what interests all of you most these days?" Trelawney asked.

"Whose gonna win the quidditch cup," Erin Cadwaller said.

"Well, no, that's not what I was thinking."

"When this class is going to end."

"We already established that it would end in forty nine minutes."

"Forty six and a ten, nine seconds." Trey corrected her.

"Fine! Fine! Shush! I am talking about romance, you thick skulled trolls!" Trelawney bellowed. "Your stupid little lives are run by your hormones!"

Clarissa nodded. "She's on a roll with being right about stuff today."

"Why thank you Miss Hawthorne," Trelawney said, clearly missing the sarcasm behind Clarissa's compliment.

"Now I shall warn you, this sort of premonition tends to be a self fulfilling prophecy sort of thing. If you use this spell scarcely, and by scarcely I mean, by maybe once or twice every fifteen years or so, then it is fairly truthful. If you use it like a cheat sheet on a test, then it will turn into the self fulfilling prophecy, because eventually you will cause what you see in your globe. So do not, I REPEAT DO NOT, use this spell outside of my classroom. In fact, it is not even legal to use this spell without a licensed Seer present."

"Someone gave you a license?" Trey gawked.

Trelawney chose to ignore that and just started humming a few lines of an ancient Gaelic tune he recognized. She started speaking fluently in the worn out language, her tongue quickly gliding over the words, so that even if Draco wanted to, he could not have repeated the spell.

She came to an abrupt stop and turned to the fourteen faces staring at her. She looked extremely pleased that she for once had everyone's attention. "Now, I want you to trace the symbol for love and commitment on the face of your ball. Carefully, Simon, this is not a doodle pad! Repeat after me."

_Reveal my horizon five winters forward_

_Reveal the holder of my heart_

_The companion to my journey on the crumbled path_

_The one closest to me, in heart, distance, and secret_

_Reveal my horizon_

Clarissa and Draco repeated just as Trelawney had said, with the emphasis on the word five and the half cough she had on the word journey, which Draco was pretty sure they were not supposed to repeat.

He placed his hands on the globe, nearly pulling them back at the icy feel of it. He gazed into the globe. Absolutely nothing, it was just cold.

Then, just as he was about to move his hands away for fear of frostbite, he realized that it wasn't empty, it was snowing in the globe. The whole scene was covered in a thick blanket of snow, a rather picturesque nighttime view. The only light was coming from a streetlamp, farther down the road. He looked around, his nose now practically up against the globe, but he didn't see anyone. Then she appeared.

She was tall, nearly as tall as him. She was skinny, dressed in all black; black boots, a black cloak, a black hat. All he could see was a peak of her pale face and sprinkle of freckles. She was walking towards him, a grey wolf, that was clearly tamed, walking behind her; he was her companion. She smiled at him, or so it looked, it was really hard to tell in the snow, before turning around and walking behind the cabin they were at, the wolf followed her, but that wasn't what caught Draco's attention. It was the only spot of color in the picture; a spot of flaming red hair peaked out from under her cap.

"Draco, come see!" Clarissa called, snapping him out of his stare at his crystal ball.

Draco let go, accidentally at Clarissa's exclamation and the girl vanished from the globe as suddenly as she appeared.

Draco stood up and looked over Clarissa's shoulder.

"This, my students, is called the Future Companion Forecast." Trelawney said, trying to sound mystical. "The spell, a particular favorite of the more flashy Seers, was designed to show you the person that you are connected most with five years from now. Now typically, I'd say with ninety nine out of a hundred cases, it is the viewer's significant other that they see, occasionally it is a very close friend. Don't get me wrong, this is not one hundred percent accurate, it is merely a forecast, it only picks up on the fuzzy vibes of the future. That is why it is occasionally a self fulfilling prophecy, because the one that uses it repeatedly will become obsessed with looking for the hypothetical blonde haired girl that he will supposedly marry. He will shut out all others and become obsessive about locating this one soul. You must take this spell with caution."

His future was with the red haired girl? Where was Blaise?

"Look," Clarissa said, causing him to focus once again. "What's wrong with Joel? He looks so different. He's definitely changed."

Draco looked. She was clearly still with Joel all right, but she was right. He looked different. A bit taller and lanker; he had definitely lost some weight and he was never a heavy guy to begin with. His hair was a bit curlier. The only thing that didn't jump out as different was his eyes. He was still staring at Clarissa with the same admiration; his huge brown eyes lit up whenever he saw her. He looked younger than he should be, he only looked to be about eighteen or nineteen, not twenty three like he should be in that globe. In fact, Draco almost thought he looked older today than he is going to look in five years. That struck him as odd, but it was clearly Joel standing there in the theater, waiting for Clarissa.

"Professor Trelawney, my crystal ball keeps going black," Caitlin Rogers said, shaking it furiously.

"Mine too," Ricky, a small dark haired boy that looked about three years younger than he actually was, called out.

"Yeah, I think my globe's broke." Theodore Nott growled.

"Huh," Trelawney said, gliding over to Caitlin to see what the problem was, clearly basking in the glow that her lesson was actually enjoyed by most.

"Who did you see?" Clarissa asked, once she was done examining Joel. Draco could tell she stopped because it freaked her out.

"I don't know." Draco answered. "It was heavily snowing wherever we were, she was bundled up, it was hard to tell." He sort of lied. No need to mention that he could tell it wasn't Blaise.

"Oh, that bites." Clarissa said, packing up her books.

The two walked out of the tower together.

Clarissa stopped right before the Slytherin entrance. "Um, Draco do you mind if we not mention this to anyone?"

Draco heaved a sigh of relief. "That sounds like a good idea."

Clarissa smiled weakly and ducked into the dungeons they called home.

* * *

"Want to go outside?" Blaise asked him. "It's snowing."

"Sure," he said, trying desperately to throw yesterday's event behind him. He almost couldn't face Blaise yesterday. Clarissa and him exchanged awkward glances all night, which he was sure Joel, Graham, and Blaise all picked up on.

"Are you okay?" She asked, once they were outside and away from ear shot of anyone.

"Yes," he answered, probably a little too quickly, because she just raised one eyebrow.

"Are you sure?" She asked, stopping and turning to face him.

"Yes," he said, clapping a hand on her shoulder. "Thanks for the concern."

"No problem," She said, mocking his awkwardness as she punched him back on the arm for the awkward clapping of the shoulder.

Draco just looked at her as her mitten impacted the arm of his jacket. "What?" she asked, "Isn't that what guys do?"

Draco smiled and put his arm around her shoulder. "No," he said slyly, "we do this!" and he turned and grabbed her, flinging her over his shoulder and spinning around, causing Blaise to squeal and kick in delight.

"Stop!" She squealed as the two spun in the cold night air. "Draco, put me down!"

He continued to spin, the two laughing and yelling, the snow falling down around them.

"I'm serious!" She half giggled, half yelled. "We're going to get in trouble!"

He continued to spin, slowly letting her down, until she was eye to eye with him, which meant her boots were resting on his own pair, so that they were at the same height, still locked in a tight embrace, spinning as if they were in their own snow globe.

In their snow globe, there were no Death Eaters; no parents; no red haired girls from the future; no impending promise of death and disaster. All that was in their snow globe, was two sixteen year olds, both wise beyond years, and both happier at that particular moment than either had ever been in their entire lives.

Draco didn't want this five winters from now; he wanted this forever.

* * *

Author's Note: Okay, so I managed to crank this chapter out in a mere ten minutes, which was really odd, because I'd been having a writer's block on this chapter since early June. It was also really odd because it is 101 degrees outside here and I'm writing about snow. Now, I really want some snow, but I'm going to have to wait like five months and that just sucks. Oh well.

And more on the chapter. It's divided into four parts, none of which actually seem that significant, but in actuality this chapter is crucial despite how minor each scene appears. Each section contains some keys to future happenings in the story. If I didn't title each chapter after the song, I would definitely call this "the Premonition Chapter". A lot of hints are dropped. Several people asked about the future of the characters, some questions are definitely answered concerning the fate of several of the main ones.

Anyway, please, please, please review!

Love ya!

Preppy in Pink


	10. Last Chance

**_This is me calling you out_**

**_For these built up superstitions_**

**_They haunt me and then_**

**_With just little light down here_**

**_Well, I would run_**

**_I would cross a thousand seas_**

**_And in our perfect world_**

**_You would wait at the other side_**

**_And I know you,_**

**_You follow up with all the answers_**

**_Last Chance by Cartel._**

****

* * *

****

Blaise laughed as they spun around to the non-existent music of the chilly, snowy night.

"Sorry I couldn't take you to the dance," Draco whispered in her ear as if there were millions around that could over hear him.

"This was way better," She said, not only with her words but with her smile and her sparkling green eyes; which were significantly less cloudy than when he met her. She held less secrets now.

"So what did happen at the dance with you and Dean?" Draco asked, arms still around her.

Blaise smiled mischievously. "A lady never tells." She laughed and darted away, spinning around in circles, arms outstretched just like a child. From the way she was laughing, Draco guessed she hadn't had much of a childhood. Even now, Blaise was almost always the grown-up.

* * *

"Will you two freaking stop it?" Joel yelled at Jesse and Blaise who continued to bat a bludger between the two of them. They responded by laughing.

"Hart, pay attention, damn it!" Joel bellowed. Jamie, who had nearly lost his seating as he dove for one of Graham's quaffles, scowled.

Clearly, Joel was sore about something.

"Everything all right?" Draco asked.

"No, I'm not!" Blaise giggled loudly in response to something Jesse had said.

Joel sighed. "It's nothing."

"Oh, you are real cute." Blaise teased Jesse, once again in response to something Jesse said to her.

"What's wrong, Joel?" Draco asked again, only half heartedly. He wanted to know what Jesse was saying.

"It's Clarissa." Joel said. "Let's talk over here." He said, leading Draco even farther away from Blaise and Jesse. Now he wasn't even facing them. Great.

"She's just been acting so different lately." Joel started.

"Stop, that tickles!" Blaise squealed.

Draco could barely contain himself. He desperately wanted to whip around and see what Jesse was doing. But whatever it was, it didn't cause Joel the PDA Nazi to freak out, so he figured it couldn't be that bad.

"Do you know if she's mad at me?" Joel asked, wringing his hands around the top of his broom.

"Not to my knowledge," Draco honestly answered, although he did know why she was acting weird. But he couldn't mention the globe. The fact that Joel looked so familiar yet so very different. He just couldn't. Because then his red haired girl would be called out into question.

"Okay," Joel said, settling for this answer because he seemed to know that he would not get anything else from Draco.

"Would you two cut it out?" Joel snapped, turning his attention back to the group.

"Is everything okay?" Clarissa asked Draco later as Joel was preoccupied with reprimanding Graham's poor diving stance.

"He thinks something is up with you." Draco replied.

"Did you tell him?" Clarissa asked. "Please tell me you didn't."

"No, I didn't" Draco said. "But you should say something to him."

"I want to understand it better." She said, looking down at her shoes. "Before I say anything. That is not my Joel in that globe."

She looked up and looked at Draco. "Will you help me?"

* * *

"Trelawney's got to have a book on it, somewhere in here." Clarissa said, as she opened the door to Trelawney's classroom.

"I don't see it," A voice from around the corner said. Draco and Clarissa froze. Trelawney was supposed to be at dinner.

Whether or not Trelawney was actually at dinner, they didn't find out, because the voice belonged to Caitlin Rogers, a Ravenclaw. Finn Colin, her boyfriend and fellow seventh year, was standing behind her, the two girls and two boys just stood there staring at each other.

Finn instantly flashed a brilliant shade of red, while Caitlin nearly bored a hole in the floor with her concentrated stare. Draco noticed Clarissa eyeing the door, everyone embarrassed that they had been caught in a compromising stance.

"Fine," Caitlin said. Finn and her must have been exchanging glances when Draco wasn't looking.

"We came to find the spell." Finn answered, still fairly red.

"So did we." Clarissa replied.

"It wasn't fair, my crystal ball didn't work." Caitlin justified her breaking and entering.

"I let go and barely saw the picture." Draco replied.

"She had the book on her desk last." Clarissa answered, blatantly ignoring Draco and Caitlin's excuses, pointing at a desk that was covered in mounds and mounds of books and papers and trinkets. Trelawney appeared to collect more gadgets than Mr. Weasley himself.

"Even if we find it, I can't read Gaelic." Finn confessed.

"Let's just find it first, okay?" Clarissa snapped, knocking a deck of tarot cards right off the desk and into Caitlin's shin. The deck scattered across the scuffed hardwood floors of the tower.

"I speak some Gaelic." Caitlin answered as she picked up a hermit card. Draco found it a little odd that her boyfriend didn't know this, but he didn't mention it.

"Here it is!" Clarissa said. Caitlin dropped the card and pulled the book from Clarissa's hands. Clarissa opened her mouth as if she wanted to argue, but shut it when she realized that she couldn't because Gaelic was foreign to her.

Caitlin's rather scratchy voice sounded even harsher with the foreign words. Trelawney's voice glided over it much better. Clearly Caitlin had taken this course for an easy 'Outstanding' as well.

Clarissa reached for the crystal ball on Trelawney's desk, but Caitlin snatched it up first, and practically hugged it to her chest to keep Clarissa from seeing what she wanted to see first.

"It didn't work!" Caitlin whined after about a minute. The ball remained black, just as it had two days before.

Draco wondered if it was Caitlin's raspy voice. He wondered if Finn liked the raspy-ness. He couldn't quite decide if he liked it or not.

"Can we go now before we get caught?" Finn asked, taking the crystal globe out of Caitlin's hands. As soon as he touched it, he nearly dropped it, a picture flashed across the face.

"What?" Caitlin said, grabbing at it again. It remained black. "Touch it, Finn!"

Finn, Draco quickly realized, did not wear the pants in this relationship. He picked it back up. The image flashed back on the screen. It was Finn, about five years older. He needed to shave, reddish scruff was on his face that wasn't there now. His shoulders looked a little broader and he had changed his glasses' frames. A semi-familiar girl with honey colored locks wandered into the picture. She was smiling. She wrapped her arms around Finn's neck and kissed him hello on the cheek.

"How was the lab?" he asked, taking her coat.

She smiled. "Pretty good. Kelly thinks we should finish the project by the middle of next week."

"What the hell is this?" Caitlin hissed. "Is that Moira? From your chess club?"

"I don't know!" Finn warbled, looking terrified for his life.

"That is, that is Moira!" Caitlin growled. "Do you guys really play chess or do you stare at her chest?"

"What?!?!" Finn asked. "Caitlin, I love you!"

"You have a funny way of showing it!" She screamed back, waving her manicured hand at the crystal ball.

"I have no control over that!" Finn snapped, finally losing his cool with Caitlin. "This is ridiculous. You performed the freaking spell!"

"Oh, so now you are going to blame your cheating ways on me?" Caitlin hollered, no longer seeming to care if they got caught.

"It's divination! You don't even believe in that load of junk!" Finn retorted.

"Just let them be," Clarissa said, taking the ball from where Finn had left it on the desk.

There he was. The thinner, lankier Joel stared back at them. His hair was curlier, he looked younger than he did now. His brown eyes were the same though. Just as last time.

"Why?" Clarissa asked, shaking the ball. "What's wrong with him?"

"I don't think anything's wrong with him." Draco said slowly, to judge Clarissa's reaction. She didn't argue. She just looked defeated. "He's just different."

"Like Finn said, it's just stupid divination." She snapped, suddenly caring again, as she dropped the ball into Draco's hand.

It went cold instantly. Draco almost didn't want to look. But he did.

She was there again. They were walking in the snow. Draco thought he looked about the same, maybe a little paler. They were heavily bundled up, both of them in layers of black winter clothing. The wolf/dog walked on the other side of the girl. Draco tried to turn and look at her face, but at that moment she turned her attention to something in a nearby tree, so Draco only got a look at the back of her hat. A tuft of red hair peaked out from under it, the only real color in the whole picture.

"Someone's coming!" Clarissa yelped from her watch point at the door. Caitlin stopped blubbering instantly, Finn turned red, and Draco dropped the crystal ball on the desk. The felon foursome took off towards the back door.

"It's locked!" Finn harshly whispered.

"Shh," Clarissa said.

Two sets of footsteps approached the main entrance of the tower.

"Headmaster, you must understand, the signs, the signs!" Professor Trelawney said.

"Sybill, you have been recalling signs for years now." Dumbledore reminded her. He sighed and added, "but if you have any new information…"

"Yes, yes, I do!" She said, playing with a large ruby ring on her middle finger. "Many crystal balls were black!"

"I beg, your pardon?" Dumbledore replied.

"I got it!" Finn said, having picked the lock. He scurried out, Clarissa on his tail. Caitlin didn't budge. She was blocking Draco.

"Black?" Dumbledore repeated.

"Dark! Empty!" She said, throwing her hands in the air for emphasis.

Draco sudden felt a wave a nausea crash down on him. "Go," he said, pushing Caitlin out the door. He knew what Trelawney was going to say, and he didn't think Caitlin needed to hear it.

"I wanted to hear that!" Caitlin growled, rubbing her elbow, and they followed the corridor down to where they assumed Clarissa and Finn would be waiting for them.

"No, you didn't." Draco assured her.

"Don't tell me what I want." Caitlin growled. She reminded him of Hermione in a way. And that was not a good thing.

"Listen, you didn't want to hear that, okay?" Draco said, grabbing her by the arm. Caitlin may have been older, but he had a good four inches on her.

"Okay," she agreed, sensing the seriousness and fear in his eyes.

"And don't blame Finn for anything." He added before letting her arm go. "There's nothing between him and Moira."

"Okay." She said, confused, but accepting. They could see Clarissa and Finn waiting by a statue of Dewey the Noble further down the hall. "Draco?"

"Yeah?"

"Is everything going to be okay? What did you see in your crystal ball? Did you see something important?" Caitlin asked, for once in her life, not bossy.

"Let's just live in the present, not in the future, okay?" He said, wishing that was as easy as it sounded.

* * *

"Are you okay?" Blaise said, placing one of her tiny hands on his shoulder.

"I'm fine. Why do you ask?" Draco replied, not really looking at her, but at the book in his lap.

"Oh, I don't know, maybe because you jumped about three feet when I touched you?" Blaise said, raised eyebrow and raised suspicion. "I mean I know some guys still think girls have cooties, but I didn't really take you to be one of them."

"Ha, ha, you're funny." He said.

Blaise smiled. "There's my Draco." She said, sitting down on the stone bench next to him. He was acutely aware of how she called him 'her Draco' and he most certainly did not hate it.

"Watcha reading?" She asked after a few silent seconds.

"Nothing." Draco said, stuffing the divination book back in his messenger bag.

"Okay," She said, pulling a little further away from him.

Draco noted this too. "Want to go get dinner?" he asked her, desperate for a change in the focus of the conversation.

"Sure," She said, getting to her feet and offering a hand to help him.

"Thanks."

They started walking across the leaf covered courtyard. "Draco?" She said. "It's cold."

"Yeah, it is." He replied. He looked at her and smiled and then, without thinking, he put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer.

"You're warm." She said, leaning her head on his shoulder as they walked. Whatever part of him that had been questioning something between her and Jesse completely disappeared. Whatever part of him wondered where his red haired friend was, was completely ignored. He didn't want to know. He just wanted to enjoy this moment.

And while he was in a good place, he knew it would only be a matter of time before everything came rushing back to him and weighed his thoughts down.

But he would be happy for this moment.

"You know what?" Blaise said, looking up at him slightly, her head still on his shoulder. "Today was a pretty great day."

"Oh yeah?" He replied, with a smile in his eyes to match the smile on his lips. "I wouldn't be able to take credit for any of it, would I?"

Blaise looked away coyly. "Well, I guess it depends on how the rest of the day goes. Its not over yet, you know."

"No, its not." He agreed, with a much more melancholy tone than her, but she didn't seem to notice for once. She was happy and that made him immensely happier than he ever imagined life with the red haired girl could be. "No, its not."

And it was that moment that he was determined to fight the "fate" the crystal ball had handed him. His fiery haired friend would not be there. He would be with Blaise, protect her as long as he could. He had to; he didn't think he'd have the strength to carry on otherwise.


End file.
